PERCEIVED ROLE OF ENTERTAINMENT TELEVISION IN SHAPING SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR OF TEENAGERS BY

Television has evolved into a potent force to be reckoned with in the transmission of social values and norms in a civilised society. Moreover, there are TV stations that have emerged with specialised programming in entertainment, called entertainment television. The study, which this paper represents, sought to find out the frequency of teenagers ’ exposure to entertainment TV; the kinds of entertainment programmes they watch; what they pay attention to in the programmes they watch; and how the entertainment programmes shape their world view concerning social behaviour in their environment. The results show that teenagers frequently watched entertainment TV as represented by 81.9 % of them who indicated so. It was also evident that there was a significant relationship between teenagers frequency of exposure to entertainment television and programmes, and its role in shaping their social behaviour. It was also noted that the influence of the programmes on the teenagers could be negative or positive depending on the individual teenager and the kind of programme he or she is frequently exposed to. The paper recommends that entertainment programme producers should develop, produce and broadcast entertainment programmes with high positive values, while the negative social values should be presented as unacceptable