Published: September 19, 2007

A new study just released by researchers at the University of Southern California (USC) shows that children do pay a lot of attention to what they see on TV and this time it is a good thing. The NBC hit drama, ER, did a three-part story on teen obesity, hypertension and healthy eating habits and the researchers conducted a study to see what, if any impact the show had on American teens.

The show focused on an African-American teen who was diagnosed with hypertension when he was in the emergency room and was advised to eat more fruits and vegetables and also get more exercise. The original air time was from April 29 to May 13,2004.

They evaluated the impact of the story by using three separate sets of data. One of them provided data on a sample of 807 prime time TV viewers, taken both before and after the three episodes aired. The surveys were collected by an independent firm. They measured whether their self reported behavior, nutritional habits, knowledge as well as practices were influenced by the storyline.

The results were that those who watched the ER episodes were 65% more likely to report a positive change. They also showed that the storyline had at least some impact. Those who watched ER had a 5% higher rate of knowledge concerning nutrition facts than those who did not watch. In coming up with the conclusions, the researchers figured in differences such as age, sex, ethnicity, income and education

One interesting result was that the men were more effected then women. The theory behind this is that men in general have a lower knowledge of the issues in the episodes.

The overall impact of the study may be small, but it does point out the fact that entertainment on television has the potential to be a way to get health information across to the public.

The study shows the importance if programs that are targeted to the public. There are so many health issues today that we need to use every means of communication to get the point across.

The researchers also believe that public health experts should be playing a part in the health messages that viewers see. For instance, for this particular story line, the producers of ER consulted with the Hollywood, Health & Society (HH&S) project at the USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center.

The researcher on the project are Thomas W. Valente, Sheila Murphy, Grace Huang, Jodi Gusek, Jennie Greene, Vicki Beck.