The majority of parents, I would hope all parents, will tell you that they want nothing but the best for their children. They want their children to grow up and become respectful, hard-working, and honest adults that are able to find happiness and success with anything that they do.

Not many parents will tell you that they hope their child is having intercourse before the age of 16, or that they become pregnant before reaching the age of majority. Likewise, few parents envision their child turning into a physically aggressive adult that lead a life of violence.

So what does that have to do with television and video games?

Well, according to a study in the journal Pediatrics, there is an increased chance of teen pregnancy among children that watch television programs with risky sexual behavior by teens.

According to the study, researchers recruited adolescents aged 12 to 17 and surveyed them three times between 2001 and 2004, asking about television viewing habits, sexual behavior and pregnancy. Among 718 teenagers, there were 91 pregnancies. The adolescents who watched the most sexy television were at double the risk of becoming, or causing, a pregnancy compared to the adolescents watching the fewest such programs.

With regard to video games, another study in the journal indicates that children that play violent video games show an increase in physically aggressive behavior.

Aggressiveness in children is often associated with violence later on in life, meaning violent video games may pose a significant risk to our children. How many violent games do you think the school bully is playing?

Considering the above information, let me ask you a question.

How closely are you monitoring what your children watch and play?

Obviously there is a line that must be drawn, as there is only so much that parents can realistically do to prevent their children from playing violent video games or watching racy television programs.

Are your children permitted to have televisions in their room?

Is access to the Interweb allowed behind closed doors?

What type of video games are they playing?

Do you know what they are doing when over at a friends house?

That last one is a tricky situation, and is part of my motivation in writing this post. Like it or not, different parents have different rules when it comes to what their children can and cannot do. As a parent, it is your job to become acquainted with the parents of your child’s friends and get a feeling for where those boundaries exist in their house.

For instance, we know that one of our oldest son’s friends has very little parental supervision when it comes to the video games that are permitted. This other boy is permitted to play games that have an “M” rating.

Sorry, that doesn’t fly in our house.

Since we cannot control what takes place at a friends house, we have learned that there are some friends that are welcome to come to our house and play, but our kids will not be permitted to play at the friends house due to rules that we are not comfortable with.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am not one that believes that video games or sexual television programs are to blame for the problematic behavior of children.

Actually, I believe that the children playing these games and watching these programs have a larger problem – parents that are not involved in their lives.

Talk to your children.

Explain things to them when they have questions.

Be involved in their lives; set rules and boundaries with regard to what is acceptable.

These are the things that I believe will have a far greater impact on your child, as they will then have a better understanding of the consequences surrounding things like violent video games or television programs that push the envelope.