You are so right. Studies that tell us the average person will die sooner if they smoke or do drugs or drive drunk or play with matches or eat their way to 500 pounds or use tanning beds or have unprotected sex etc etc are just completely useless!

Everyone dies so what difference does it make if you die at 80 or 40, right? Right?

Let's ignore science... it's just too much for my little brain to handle. I think I'll go climb an unstable ladder next to some power lines.

The problem is not the science. It's the B.S. logic in the way the statistic is presented. Watching T.V. is not the problem, it's the lack of exercise.

I am sorry James, but you are the kind of people this article and study was meant to reach. You that believe so faithfully in the made up BS that they want you to believe.

This isn't science. There was NO observational data. They didn't have a crystal ball which would tell the researchers when these people would die and then observe their lives and time how much earlier they actually died. What is the control group? The test group..

Using their same definition of inactivity... reading a book... SLEEPING.... all some how shorten your lifespan. My grandfather smoked a pack of cigarettes every single day for 80 years and died at 102. Now these researchers are also claiming that 2 cigarettes is equivalent to those same 22 minutes. After some quick math..... Apparently if my grandfather never smoked, he would have lived to 114. Oh wait.... He also watched a LOT of TV after he was 70. I mean.... that is all he did really after that.

Wow... he might have set the record for longest lifespan...

Lets not blame one thing. Lets make this easier... Every hour that you sit and do nothing active may shorten your life by 22 minutes. You also can't work out ever, over eat, eat unhealthy, and stay physically unproductive.

This article is funny.

Listening to Obama shortens everyones life, he-he!

I'm just joking!

My grandfather smoked a pack of cigarettes every single day for 80 years and died at 102.

Last time I checked, statistics aren't determined by anecdotal evidence. The fact that one person can smoke every day and live to 102 doesn't mean a damned thing in the face of the fact that hundreds of thousands of people die every year from smoking related lung cancer.

Science isn't based on whether your mother's uncle's best friend's wife lived to 100. It's based on averages and aggregate numbers.

This article doesn't delve into the details of this particular study, so sure, maybe it's flawed. But every time a study shows that ON AVERAGE people who live a certain way die sooner than people who don't, all the scientifically stunted people on Newsvine get on here with their personal stories and their "we all die" rants that completely miss the point of STATISTICS.

One really fed up boomer,

This is what happens when statisticians get bored and run amok.

One feed up boomer ...... good post! ...

Geez.... I ought to be dead by now. Cigarettes take 11 min. off your life and 1 hr of tv takes 22 min. Yeah... I'm pretty sure I should be dead by now if what all these experts say is true.

Study: An hour of TV can shorten your life by 22 minutes

Who would pay for such a study?

The next study will be:

"Newsvine readers will lose 30 minutes of their life: Study finds."

You all aren't seeing the good news in this article. If we all just stop watching TV, we would all live forever!!! That or till at least 150 years old. 80 can become the new middle age.

All of my grandparents watched television and two lived in to their 70's, one late 80's and my grandfather was 98!!!

The problem is not actually TV itself but the lack of activity by the viewer for long periods...

It's good to know that we Americans aren't the only people who pay for useless studies that tell us what we already know.

The social security and Medicare shortfall is now solved; by using this formula the Average young American will not reach the age of 65; Viola, problem solved; it may be a government conspiracy, watching most of the TV shows today will also bore you to death, cause you to worry that you are not to bright, not gay,and not taking as much medicine's that will cure everything from ED, to dandruff !

This is a dumb study to publish. They act as if before TV people were constantly in a state of motion at all times. Before TV people just sat around and listened to the radio or read a book or talked to each other. What is their suggestion, constantly have your body moving around until you go to sleep? This study is basing it's facts on obese and out of shape individuals sitting around. It is not harmful to someone who exercises regularly or is constantly moving most of the day at work. I am sure they could do a study showing how many minutes of life you lose by not getting enough rest either.

Reading and believing this "Scientific Study" can cause an individual to actually become healthier. Haven't they been reading the Scientific Literature on Laughter, Laughter is the Best Medicine and this report is a joke. This is just another example of "Junk Science", people justifying their own existence by creating justification for receiving huge salaries. They tell us what to eat, when and how to sleep and how, when and where to exercise. Then the Government pass laws and regulations based on these "Junk Science" results that are paid for by Tax Payers.

"all the scientifically stunted people on Newsvine get on here with their personal stories and their "we all die" rants that completely miss the point of STATISTICS."

As Mark Twain said ....

There are Lies,

Damn Lies,

and STATISTICS

The problem is not actually tv itself...

Then why does the headline say "An Hour of TV Can Shorten Your Life by 22 Minutes"?

The title is much more attention-grabbing than if they'd just come out & said, "inactivity is bad for you, now get moving" in the title.

Tina,

Because it's flawed.

The basic question is, if the report is true, why has life expectancy gone up since the 1950s when TVs began to be widely distributed? If it was true, then life expectancy should have severely dipped by the late 50s, when TV watching became widespread, and before medical science had a chance to offset the sudden higher death rate.

Worded another way, what the article claims is that you are removing 1/3 of the time you spend watching TV from your life expectancy. (20 out of every 60 min) So do you really believe that medical advances can offset such a HUGE effect on life expectancy?

Living is the leading cause of death.

Why don't chess players die more often? They are sitting for about 22 minutes per game?

Where do I apply for the billion dollar grant to study sitting chess versus standing chess?

Is speed chess better or worse?

WinkWink,

Good point! But I think birth is the leading cause of death. You have to be born before you can live.

Follow the money. Who paid for the study and what's in it for them?

If you really think these people give a rats AZZ about health issues you're eyes aren't open far enough.

What really burns me is when they admit it really has NOTHING to do with watching TV at all. This means the study is utterly FALSE. I'm sure the average pro athlete, who is totally in shape, physically fit and maybe even abnormally ACTIVE can watch two hours of TV before bed with no ill effects on his lifespan whatsoever. So why not just leave the TV out of it?

I'll tell you why: these researchers wanted to get ATTENTION. They wanted to justify their own existence. They had to have a "hook", and were willing to create one out of thin air. Thus, TV was used. Case closed: these researchers can't be trusted and neither can whoever is paying them.

I'm happily surprised to see that most readers have seen through the BS on this one. Studies can be tremendously useful when they are honest, unbiased and scientifically conducted. I don't think there was anything wrong with the science used in this study, but the results were twisted in a way that is truly despicable, IMO.

Hey, that's a great reason to jack up those cable bills, but then again, how are the powers that be going to fool the proles if they don't get fed BS 24/7?

As a scientist who usually enjoys reading these types of articles, I have to admit this is one study that reeks of BS. Extrapolation of their supposed age at death? Come on. They studied 25 year olds in 2000. That puts every study participant at age 36 now. Come back to me in the year 2050, or even 2075, and let me know how much "shorter" the TV viewers' lifespans were...then you might have some EVIDENCE to backup your ridiculous claim.

Hey Faux-Boomer (One really fed up boomer) -

Have you ever been sucking down the Koolaid! This planet can sustain many billions. Your number of less than 2 billion is the "anti-human existence" groups claim.
And don't give me that hogwash about the starving in Africa. they have been starving in Africa since the world began. It is because of political and Warlord strangleholds that keep the people from getting the food. That and a lack of technology, husbandry and crop knowledge. And guess why THAT is? Because the majority religion in Africa is Islam. Backward, anti-Western Islam.
So go back to smoking your weed and leave the thinking to those who still can.

The ONLY reason an hour of TV may shorten your life by 22 minutes, is exactly as someone else has said here - it's the commercials stupid! they interrupt the pleasure center of our brains (activated by our favorite TV programs) with screaming ads that literally set us in a flight of flight mode suddenly! Even when using a DVR, I suspect we still lose about 5 minutes of life per hour of show due to having to FF through the dam commercials!

A Smarter Boomer

Was replying to : One really fed up boomer

Be polite! You can differ, but there is no point of attack with this nonsensical news article. Save your 'mustard' for something that matters.

Vitriol, should be used wisely.

I reply with respect to you.

Mark Twain also said "I take my only exercise acting as a pallbearer at the funerals of my friends who exercise regularly."

To Fed Up Boomer: If you were to take your own life, or at least have your nads clipped you would be helping to solve the problem (at least a problem that you recognize).

To Smart Boomer: Right on. The "self loathing" human crap is worse than bad science, it is diabolical and needs to be challenged at every turn. It is more dangerous to our continued well being than TV, global warmin...I mean climate change, and killer bees combined.

To Leiya: See above comment. Dangerous crap needs to labeled as...well...DANGEROUS CRAP.

And finally, to this study, wow! What a great use of funds. I hope my last comment broke the needle off of the irony meter.

Bill, really. We're going to need that irony meter. Although if you only broke the needle, it should be easy enough to cobble up another one.

Watching TV?, Reading Books? HELP!!! I just found out I am dead!

It's not prejudice. Australians 25 and older don't spend as much time reading books as they do watching TV, so a study on watching TV has broader implications than one on reading books.

RamFla.... do you walk around very slowly with your arms outstretched mumbling brains, brains....

EXACTLY my thoughts when I read this. Apparently, according to some people, we need to be moving and exercising every waking moment. Add to that, eat very little crappy tasting food infrequently. Given that, who would want to live longer?

Excellent point tag, and hell what does a 22 min. commute do to our poor bodies?

tag, you mean you don't read while walking or running? How inefficiently you spend your time.

What a load of crap. By their reckoning, I and many others should have died years ago. However, since we all eventually come upon our respective expiration dates, they’ll try to tie it into this spurious study at some attempt at validation. I wonder who funded this waste of money?

The problem is I doubt Australians read for 9.8 billion hours!

Reading a book requires brain power and therefore exercises the body much more than watching TV. The simple action of turning a page stimulates the muscles and keeps you moving. Mobile phones secrete microwaves into your brain which could do you serious damage. I suppose this is the same for TV's. I agree with your observation: I don't believe what this article implies. I do believe that TV leads to social degradation and we should stop relying on modern technology and live a little. Also, I think that it's the quality you produce in your life that matters, not the reduction of a mere 22 minutes.

Yeah - at least if that tv show you were watching was "Housewives of (whichever - you choose)".

Well if the statistics are correct (and they are always right aren't they), if I watch 2 hrs of TV a night, 5 nights per week for 50 years (25-75), I've just shortened my life by 397.22222 days. [22 min * 2 hrs/day * 5 days/week * 52 days/yr * 50 years / 60 min/hr /24 hrs / day] In other words, I only shortened my life by 1 year, but I've wasted 1083.3333 days that I could have been productive in other areas of my life (or about 3 years). Based on a typical work week of 40 hours, I now have 12.5 years of lost productivity. That's the real crime.

Jim-1308856

"It's cause there's 22 mins of commercials in every hour of tv."

Bingo! You win the prize of the morning! Congratulations!

This is the best response i've seen in a long time. well played

you are soooo Right! just ban comercials hawking 'medications' we don't want or really need, and we will all live longer!

Hmmm, let's see, if i add up all the life-shortening activities I have done, overweight, smoking, gettin high when I was young, reading, TV watching, etc. etc...... yup thats right, I should have died appx. 1.8 years before I was born.

Gimme a break, we all gotta go, if I live another 20 years the way I feel right now, I will be pretty pissed. Just enjoy what you have, don't worry when it will end. About 5 seconds after you are dead, it wont matter whether 5 seconds or 5 billion years have passed, you won't feel it. Right?

@Jim - Now, *this* is something that makes perfect sense!

As Mountain above said, well played, well played indeed.

/I think I can feel the prescription ads sucking out my soul!

Jim, I think this is the funniest comment to an article I've read in a long time. I'll be laughing over this for a while. Thanks for the smiles.

RIGHT, Mike as I posted below!

What about if you watch tv in the morning while riding a stationary bike, like I've been doing recently? Do I break even, or do I add time to my life, or is it just the tv thing and it doesn't matter. I need to know, because if it doesn't matter, screw the bike!

Dead man watching.

Maybe the people in australia watch only news, watching to much bad news can affect the way you think, but if you watch 60 min of any show with comedy in it , laughter is very healthy

I agree. Gee, I just ate two slices of toast with butter and jelly - who knows by how much I shortened my life? Then again, I ride a bicycle over 200 miles each week. On each ride I burn up over 2K calories.

Oh, cool - you get to PICK which parts of your life that you loose? I'm with you then. Thanks for clearing that up, because the story itself really was very short on facts...

Actually , with the quality of most of the programming on TV, they are wrong. You lose an hour of life for each hour you watch TV, and you can't get that back not matter how much you exercise.

I have vision...

gary - you obviously can't see too well because I see people exercising every time that I leave my house. People are walking around the neighborhood, using the designated bike paths along the major roads around town, jogging. There is never a time that I go to the Y that people aren't exercising all day, every day. Maybe your problem is that you live in such a bad neighborhood that people are afraid to go outdoors or maybe you choose odd hours to exercise, like 3 a.m., or maybe you posted as an excuse to tell everyone that you run 7 miles per day. Whatever, but you obviously are not very observant.

I think that depends entirely on where you live, guys. In my hometown, I see next to nobody exercising at all and then when I drive 40 minutes to work in the capitol city, I see people running all the time.

Which is why I have a DVR. I'm breaking even as I watch my shows!

In respect for the study, here's a reason why we should all be dead:

The Seven Deadly Sins of Gilligan's Island theory is quite simple. Each of the seven characters on the island represents each of the seven deadly sins. Now, this theory seems to fit upon initial inspection, there are technical difficulties when you get down to THE MAN himself, Gilligan.

Run with me on this one . . .

1. Most obvious is the Professor, who fits PRIDE to a T. Any man who can make a ham radio out of some wire and two coconuts has to be pretty cocky. His character was later revised and given a series of his own, called "MacGyver."

2. For the sin of ENVY we need look no further than Maryann, who may have worn those skimpy little tops, but could never achieve Ginger's glamour. (As an interesting and completely irrelevant side note, a nationwide survey of college students a few years ago revealed that the professor and Maryann were voted the most likely couple to have 'done it' on the island.)

3. And who could doubt for a moment that Ginger is LUST incarnate? Sure, the kids were supposed to think she was ACTING, but we all know what being deprived episode after episode was doing to her. You know and I know that glazed look wasn't boredom, my friends.

4. What kind of person takes a trunk full of money on a three-hour cruise? Mr.Howell gets my vote for GREED.

We are now left with three characters and three Deadly Sins. We have Gilligan, the Skipper and Mrs. Howell to whom we must match GLUTTONY, SLOTH and ANGER. As you can see, there is a Gilligan problem here.

5. Certainly we can further eliminate Mrs. Howell from this equation by connecting her with SLOTH. She did jack squat during her many years on the island and everybody knows it.

6,7. This leaves ANGER and GLUTTONY, either of which the Skipper had no shortage. He was, after all, a big guy with the tendency to hit Gilligan with his hat at least once an episode. After much consideration, I have decided that he can easily do double-duty, covering the two remaining Deadly Sins.

So here we have the Seven Deadly Sins trapped in an endlessly recurring Hell of hope followed by denial and despair, forced to live with each other in our TVs until the last re-run ends. And who is their captor? What keeps them trapped there? Gilligan.

Gilligan is SATAN. Think about it.

If you have understood all of this, you are guilty of having watched too much TV. LOL

wow Zapper....was that just you being really really observant or was that the purpose of the show? I'm pretty impressed. lol

Irish, it's been around for a while. But yeah, too much tv. I'm sure there's an equivalent for the Brady Bunch, as well, but I'm not going there today.

I think the point of the study is that we should be physically active 24/7. Just keep running 'till you drop.

Wow zapper, you really nailed Gilligan. That could explain alot of things about the current state of the U.S.A...

I hope they did NOT use taxpayers money for this silly study. Living in our polluted environment, you think we need to worry about TV? LOL

THey should really publish a study of how TV ages our brains.

You bring the chips and dip, I'll bring the soda. We can sit around and watch eternal tv together.

Yeah. And work is alot more stressful than TV. Unless you're watching "Jersey Shore". Snooki really gets me wound up.

With water and air pollution which will definitely shorten our lives, TV is the last thing we should be worrying about.