Smarter TV Shows, Smarter Audiences - Essay Example

In “Watching TV Makes You Smarter,” Johnson argues that through the concept of the “Sleeper Curve,” current TV shows are better in quality and produce positive thinking outcomes for their audiences. Based on this curve, throughout time, the median cognitive demands of popular media are increasing. Johnson argues that watching TV can make people smarter because of its complex plots and rounded characters force people to focus, to produce inferences, and to understand changing relationships (279).

I agree with him that some TV shows are complex and fascinating enough to enhance the thinking skills of people, but this only applies if people have critical and inference skills, to begin with. Instead of predicting shows because of their repetitive formula plots, people cannot always determine what will happen next and they are strained to think more so that they can understand the plot and characters.On the contrary, I do not agree that all TV shows follow the Sleeper Curve if the audiences do not have critical and inference skills to start with.

I do not believe that parents should allow children to watch shows that have a high content of sex and violence. They do not have enough critical thinking skills to know what is right or wrong, and what is real and made-up. It is like a neighbor who likes 24 for its action content but is not interested in making inferences about the plot and the people. Instead, I hear him saying that Muslims are mainly terrorists and that many immigrants are criminals. He does not have the skills to attain the Sleeper Curve as Johnson describes it.

Instead of thinking better, he feeds on the stereotypes that the show presents.The Sleeper Curve is not true for all. It only applies to people who have critical thinking and logic skills. Present-day TV shows might be smarter, but unless people have developed their cognitive skills, they are not better off watching them. Sometimes, they are even worse off, if they use it to reinforce their prejudice and biases.