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Nerdy autobiographical note in Sesame/TV's defense: My parents (who banned all television save Mister Rogers and the Electric Company, and possibly Masterpiece Theatre) insist that it was specifically "Sesame Street" that taught me to read, pre-age 3.
Lynn, me too, although it's possible that having a grandmother who lived with us and read to me constantly may also have had something to do with this.
When I visit my nieces (now ages 4 and nearly 6) I notice that they spend maybe two hours a day in front of the TV, mostly watching Baby Einstein, Dora, Caillou, or some other "educational" cartoon--and I've bought them some of these tapes. What's interesting is that we assume that kids just sit slack-jawed and immobile in front of the TV, slowly getting fat and stupid, but these two work on puzzles, color, play with dolls and Tinkertoys, and all kinds of other things at the same time. And they love to read, or be read to, and go for nature walks and play outside, and they have what I think are probably normal attention spans for their age.
I'm a writer now, with a house full of books. We have a small portable television set that's around 12 years old, but it gathers dust in the guest room. We don't have cable. (We watch our movies with a laser projector and a portable roll-up screen.) If anything, it's probably a reaction to having grown up with five televisions in different parts of the house, blaring constantly (including at the dinner table, where my parents watched the nightly news). Except for the political discussions that sprang from watching the news (usually involving my father saying unprintable things about Ronald Reagan), the adults were the ones who tended to sit slackjawed in front of the idiot box.
If I had kids of my own, I don't think I'd be worried about the psychological effects of television. I'd be more worried about TV as a thief of the time that they might spend doing more interesting things. TV hasn't hurt my nieces yet--they are bright, happy little girls who are utterly absorbed in the world around them. I don't want to see that world dwindle to the four walls and Lazyboy recliners of the slackjawed adult.
