Avoiding TV and scrolling news: view information at set times instead
Original: eternity4719 · source details
Original author: eternity4719 · Chinese source: · English adaptation: parveen0029. Translation and grade notes ↗
Bibliographic titles are retained in their original language.
Source author's views and grades; not individually verified by this site.
Cost and benefit at a glance
- Check the cost Cost ↓
- No monetary cost. The real challenge is breaking the habit of turning on the TV at random times; you might also miss some breaking news.
- Then the source benefit Benefit ↓
- Americans aged 15 and older watch 2.6 hours of TV daily. Their total leisure time is 5.2 hours, so TV viewing consumes half of it. These figures are from 2025. In China, the averag…
In plain terms
Americans aged 15 and older watch 2.6 hours of TV per day, which accounts for half of all their leisure time. In China, the average daily TV viewing time is 1 hour and 40 minutes; for people aged 75–84, it reaches 3 hours and 16 minutes. Switching to viewing information at scheduled times saves you all this time.
This guide's cartoon · show illustration
Enlarge illustrationOriginal illustration with Chinese lettering; the English dialogue is below. Humour is a reading aid, not evidence.
English dialogue
- Tomorrow. Definitely.
- Which step happens today?
Cost: what it takes
No monetary cost. The real challenge is breaking the habit of turning on the TV at random times; you might also miss some breaking news.
Benefit: what the source reports
Americans aged 15 and older watch 2.6 hours of TV daily. Their total leisure time is 5.2 hours, so TV viewing consumes half of it. These figures are from 2025. In China, the average daily TV viewing time is 1 hour and 40 minutes; for those aged 75–84, it is 3 hours and 16 minutes. These numbers date back to 2018.
Conditions, limits and disagreements
Only aggregate statistics are available. No studies have examined how the time saved by cutting back on TV and news viewing is actually used. The practice of viewing content at set times is based on the author’s personal experience.
Original references
Original bibliographic titles and links are preserved; some titles are in Chinese.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2026). American Time Use Survey — 2025 Results. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/atus.nr0.htm；国家统计局 (2019). 2018年全国时间利用调查公报. https://www.stats.gov.cn/sj/zxfb/202302/t20230203_1900224.html
Medical, legal, financial and policy conditions vary by person, place and time. Policy material primarily concerns mainland China; check the cited document and current local requirements.