Pants-wearing sponge blamed for kids' poor attention spans

[Feannag]

"Rapid pace of the cartoon 'SpongeBob SquarePants' might be too much for preschoolers to take in, researcher says"

Poor SpongeBob.

Back in 2005 he caught flak from a Christian evangelical group because its leader thought he was ***. Now a small new study suggests he could be turning preschoolers' minds to mush.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44460161...ldrens_health/

[RD]

lol!

You know, when I was a kid, I didn't have a very long attention span, either. Hell, I STILL don't have a good attention span. And I've never seen an episode of Spongebob in my life.

Parents are always looking for someone or something to blame other than themselves or their kids. Some things are just boring. Some kids just don't like paying attention. Instead of wasting time with these studies (who even gives funding to someone wanting to study Spongebob???), why not try to figure out a way of helping kids pay attention without drugging them up?

[Ken Nightwind]

When my kids were little and I was teaching them how to shoot a rifle I found they were twice as likely to hit a spongebob toy target than a black bull's eye. I never let them watch it but I have always wondered if my wife did.

[satomz]

Already proven:



As you see, Sponge Bob is OBVIOUSLY not good for children's mentality and sanity.

[raspberry jam]

Already proven:

Oh god

[Rob Van Der Sloot]

I think the only thing turning people's minds to mush are these pointless fake studies.

SpongeBob might not have the same negative effect on attention in older children, the authors acknowledge. And, they write, they don’t know how long the negative effects last or what the long-term effects of regularly viewing SpongeBob, Patrick, Squidward and the gang might be.

“Maybe the next step is really to try and figure out how long-lasting these effects are,” says Georgetown University psychologist Rachel Barr.

No, the next step would be to cut any and all funding to these studies. They are flawed and biased.

Turns out the PBS and picture-drawing groups performed equally well on the tests; the SpongeBob group scored significantly worse. Watching a full half-hour fast-paced cartoon show could be even more detrimental, the study authors write.

The only thing they've shown with this study, is that apparently PBS cartoons are so slow and generic, that it doesn't even affect children in any way. You could just as well be drawing pictures, because they are that uninteresting. Yes, Spongebob is a fast paced show. But I have yet to see how according to this study it has negative effects. Children have a short attention span after watching a fast show? Well duh! But for how long? 5 minutes? See, what I think is that these adults do not understand the show. They see a walking talking sponge and think it is a stupid show, because they cannot make any sense of it. However, this betrays the ignorance of the adults, because the children seem to be understanding a bizarre type of humour that the adults struggle to understand. And because they are ashamed of this struggle, they label it as harmful to their children. Spongebob is actually a very clever well written show. I've seen it numorous times, and was surprised how cleverly bizarre it was. It almost seemed to poke fun at regular cartoons and their silly hidden messages. I think children get that, and many adults (especially the boring adults that conduct studies) don't.

I don't think cartoons affect children negatively at all. There was the same debate regarding the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles when that cartoon was still aired. Over here in Europe, they changed the name to Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles, because they deemed the Ninja part too aggresive. They even did studies wether the show or its toys made children more violent. Its absurd. At the time, neither me or my friends understood why they had to change the name of the show. It didn't make any sense. And now so many years later, it still doesn't make sense. What are these people on? These shows do not affect children. When I was young one of the first things I remember watching as a really young child, was Knightrider. Did that show make me any more violent? Or did it make me more interested in cars? Or did it make me watch more episodes of Baywatch? No. The only thing it did was provide entertainment, while teaching me English. Now there's something important. Maybe episodes of Spongebob in other countries actually help children learn English as well, as long as they are not dubbed.

[raspberry jam]

I don't think cartoons affect children negatively at all. There was the same debate regarding the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles when that cartoon was still aired. Over here in Europe, they changed the name to Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles, because they deemed the Ninja part too aggresive. They even did studies wether the show or its toys made children more violent. Its absurd.

You think that is absurd? Watch 4Kids censor the One Piece anime:



I lost my **** at 0:42, with the watergun...

[RD]

HAPPY SHOKUJI SPONNNGGGE BOB-OO

hehehe

Freaking little kids. Where's the "Itadakimasu"!?

[Zalis]

I've never understood the appeal of SpongeBob (or ponies...), but I agree that it's dumb to blame the show for sloppy parenting. Honestly, from what I can recall of my preschool years, most of the cartoons I watched were on PBS. So, LOTS of Sesame Street (yeah, not a cartoon, but it has them).

The only other thing I can remember watching back then was Looney Tunes... and we ALL know that it taught valuable lessons about gravity, physics and even chemistry.

[Zalis]

I don't know, Rob. It's dumb, but kids do dumb stuff. Common sense is developed over time. I turned out to be a productive member of society, but that doesn't mean I didn't get my arm stuck in a door one time as a very young child. (maybe 3?)

Never had any encounters with a fridge, though...