TV Networks’ Handling of Violence Praised by Study : Entertainment: Most shows are responsible, UCLA analysis says. But children’s programs are criticized.

America’s four major television networks are generally responsible in the way they portray violence in entertainment programming, although excessive violence remains a problem in their airing of theatrical films, children’s fare and on-air promotions, according to an intensive, yearlong study released Tuesday by the UCLA Center for Communication Policy.

The independent analysis of nearly 3,000 hours of programming during the 1994-95 TV season also reported that the ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox networks frequently failed to warn viewers in advance about violent programs by broadcasting parental advisory labels.

“The world of television . . . is not as violent as we had feared and not as wholesome as we might have hoped,” Jeffrey Cole, director of the center, wrote in the conclusion of the 181-page report on the first year of the three-year study, which was commissioned by the four networks. “There is room for substantial improvement.”

Overall, the study praised the networks for reducing the levels of gratuitous violence from recent years. Among 121 prime-time TV series that aired last season, only 10 raised frequent concerns about violence, as did 23 of 161 made-for-television movies.

Theatrical movies were the biggest offender, the study found, with 42% of them raising issues involving their extensive depiction of murder and mayhem.

“What we are doing is what any teacher does when he or she applies a grade, or what any judge does when he or she applies a ruling,” Cole said of his study, which used a panel of student monitors to apply a set of criteria examining violence in its context to virtually every program that aired last season on ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox.

Cole plans to sit down with network executives in the next month to explain his findings and to make recommendations--from scheduling violent images and themes later in the night to finding alternative plot devices to advance stories.

“From my impression of what UCLA’s done, this could be the beginning of a rational discussion of the subject,” said Martin D. Franks, senior vice president of CBS, who feels vindicated by the findings. “I’m only sorry that Congress didn’t wait for something rational before rushing to judgment.”

The beleaguered networks agreed to fund the watchdog study last year under heavy political pressure. But their efforts to reduce gratuitous violence were not enough to dissuade Congress from pushing ahead this year with legislation to install a computer chip in TV sets that could help parents limit what programs their children see.

Sen. Paul Simon (D-Ill.), who applied the initial pressure on the TV industry to reduce violent programming, remains hopeful that the UCLA study might influence Congress to change its mind about the computer chip approach, which has raised concern in the television industry about the government making programming decisions.

“There is a possibility that members of Congress will see that the TV industry really is getting a hold of this thing on their own, and we don’t need government involvement,” Simon said.

In the UCLA study, one of the most comprehensive ever conducted, violence was analyzed in its context--determining, for instance, whether violent acts were rewarded and whether children might be among the viewers. Many of the findings surprised those at a news conference Tuesday at UCLA.

ABC’s controversial cop drama “NYPD Blue” was lauded in the study for its responsible portrayal of violence, along with NBC’s “Law & Order” and “Homicide: Life on the Street.” Cole screened a clip from “NYPD Blue” in which a female officer shoots a man at an automated teller machine, then spends the rest of the episode reconciling the violent act.

“I’d like to think that the people who are surprised are people who haven’t watched ‘NYPD Blue’ or [haven’t] watched it carefully,” said David Westin, president of the ABC Television Network Group. “There are very constructive ways you can depict violence by showing how harmful it is or by showing its terrible impact.”

At the same time, the painful pratfalls in ABC’s “America’s Funniest Home Videos” were criticized because they are devoid of context, accompanied by funny sound effects and played for laughs.

“I appreciate what [the study] says about ‘Home Videos,’ but I think most Americans can understand those are pratfalls,” Westin said.

Six of the other series producing “frequent issues” of violence last season are not returning this fall. Those that are back are CBS’ “Walker, Texas Ranger” (cited for “prolonged, graphic scenes of hand-to-hand combat”), Fox’s “The X-Files” (for “disturbing, violent scenes in every episode”) and ABC’s “Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman” (for its “dark use of violence” in the 8 p.m. hour, when many children are in the audience).

“Even though we’re talking about some shows that raise concerns, they’re tame,” Cole said. “In prime-time series, you don’t see bullets entering bodies or knives piercing flesh. You rarely see anyone killed at all.”

The UCLA study included a sampling of cable and syndication programming, where the levels and frequency of violence were found to be much higher than on network television. But the study focused primarily on the four networks, except for news programming. The cable industry has funded a separate violence study.

In the children’s area, the UCLA report criticized Fox’s popular “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers” in a category of programs that involved “sinister combat violence.” As defined by the study: “Fighting is the main attraction or purpose of the program and the plot only provides justification for the combat.” Other shows cited in this category were “Batman and Robin,” “Skeleton Warriors,” “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” and “X-Men.”

“The fact that there remains serious problems in children’s television programs is not news, but it’s very good that this study will focus attention on that,” said Jim Steyer, president and founder of the advocacy group Children Now. “The whole genre of dark, combat scenarios is really troubling. It’s something we’ve seen develop over the last few years without that much criticism.”

The UCLA study came down hardest on theatrical movies and network promos. Although the violent scenes in theatrical movies were more heavily edited by the networks than by local TV stations, Cole said, there was still “far more force used to settle problems than necessary.”

He showed one clip from a CBS broadcast of “Ghost,” essentially a love story, in which the camera lingered for eight seconds on a man impaled on a huge shard of glass.

Cole suggested that some action films--ones with 30 to 50 scenes of violence, starring the likes of Sylvester Stallone, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal--simply may be inappropriate for network television, even edited.

Meanwhile, network promos for otherwise responsible movies or series frequently raised concerns because they came across as a compilation of violent scenes with no explanatory context. In his recommendations, Cole urged the networks to re-examine their promo policies and to make sure violent ones run when children are not likely to be watching.

Similarly, the study said the networks would have raised fewer concerns over violence had they applied parental advisory labels more judiciously to adult-themed programs.

The study found no significant difference in the amount of violence on the four networks. Fox dealt more heavily in violence earlier in the evening because it does not program the 10 p.m. hour, but it made up for it with more parental advisories, Cole said.