PT23 · S2 · Q18 Columnist: The advent of television

We might keep this on a first pass. It seems to provide data points that feel like the classic plausibility-Strengthener: where cause is absent, effect is absent. This answer has the feel of "Where there were fewer violent TV shows, there was less homicide". But, the author hasn't said anything about "violent programs" being the reason that TV led to more homicide, though, so we'd be speculating a little to think that our author was assuming that's how TV led to homicide. Also, because this language is expressed in terms of absolute, not relative, language, it's not clear what impact it would have. When we say that urban homicide rates "grew" earlier than rural homicide rates did, we're not saying they started from around the same rate and grew to the same rate. We're just saying, whatever they were at in 1958, the urban rate increased before the rural rate increased. A rural rate might have such a low average homicide rate that even once it increases you would still call it a "low" homicide rate. It's higher than before, but it's still not high. So this answer doesn't really clarify whether in these areas with low numbers of violent TV shows the homicide rate was stable or increasing.

For each of these first three answers, LSAC seems to be thinking that we should just assume that the author's concern is the effect of violent TV on the audience. That, of course, is the most common sense hypothesis of how TV could lead to more killing (but not the only one). At any rate, if we think our author is suspecting that the advent of TV led to more homicides because violent TV corrupts some of the audience into being more aggressive and violent, then this answer choice would totally weaken that storyline. If early TV was just soap operas and puppet shows, then whether you had TV or didn't wouldn't seem to have much effect on your violent tendencies.

There are two issues with trying to interpret this answer: 1. when we say "the earlier one is exposed to TV", I interpret that to probably mean "the earlier in life", i.e. "the younger you are when you're exposed to violent TV". This argument isn't about urban kids seeing violent TV at a younger age than rural kids did. It's just about "when TV arrived in your city". It would be weird to interpret "the earlier you're exposed to TV" as meaning "the earlier in the 20th century that TV became prevalent in your area". 2. "... the more profound the effect" is very vague. What is the effect? We have never established in this argument that TV has any effect on anyone, so we don't know what sort of 'effect' this is alluding to. Seeing violence on TV might make you more averse to violence, in which case this answer would weaken the argument.

In order for us to make this relevant, we would have to assume that when the advent of TV came to your area, it increased your amount of leisure time. But that doesn't make a lot of common sense. You had what leisure time you had, either way. TV is an option to fill leisure time, but it doesn't inherently create or increase your amount of leisure time.