Many of these studies were done comparing the amount of violence in children in communities with television and those without. And in all studies the children in communities with television were noticed to have greater levels of violence in them. Also studies were done where the communities without televisions were introduced to them, and it was found that the amount of violence in the children greatly increased. His second major point is that in the 1970's NBC, ABC and CBS all had studies conducted to see whether or not the claims of television's affects were true. All three companies found that the information was not to their liking. CBS was unable to keep their findings secret and they were made public. ABC published their findings in private and the general public and scientific community was not allowed access. NBC did not even release any information of any kind and tried to deny that anything significant was found. This only goes to show that many people realize it is a problem but they just are afraid to touch the issue.
In reading Siano's arguments to the effects of TV violence on children I often wondered if he agreed or disagreed with Centerwall. He came on very strongly at first stating, " the more explosions, crashes, gunshots and defective ACME catapults there are, the better it is for the little tykes" (Siano, pg 137). He continued to make points and show evidence that television does not inhibit violence in children, but he never really came out to say what he felt to be a major factor in their violent behavior. He wrote about studies that were performed showing only a slight violent increase in children after watching a violent show, yet he claims the slight increase is too insignificant to be taken into consideration. He also seems to praise the work of a man named Eron from the University of Illinois. Eron has done a lot of research on TV and its affects. Most of Siano's information is based on what Eron has observed and wrote about.
