Children actively watch an average of 80 minutes of television a day, according to a new study published in Pediatrics. That’s a lot of TV, but when you add in the amount of background television exposure these kids are getting—when a TV’s on in the same room but kids not actively watching it—the numbers are startling. The average child is exposed to 232 minutes—nearly four hours—of background television. Previous studies have found that having a TV on in the background can be just as damaging to a child’s development as when it’s being actively watched. “It’s really kind of shocking,” says study author Matthew Lapierre, an assistant professor of communication studies at the University of North Carolina-Wilmington. Children from poor families are, on average, exposed to nearly six hours of television a day. (USA Today)