I found Susan Young’s article on the front page of the Nov. 24 BDN to be quite interesting and thought provoking. According to the article, a report released recently at the Maine Principals’ Association’s annual meeting states that Maine students — especially boys — are becoming increasingly disruptive and belligerent. Incidents of disrespect, name calling and physical assaults have become a major concern to educators.

While many different opinions were offered in the article as to what could be contributing to this disturbing trend, I was surprised to reach the end of the article without anyone even suggesting the possibility that this aggressive behavior is being fueled, in part, by the type of TV programs available for children to watch. Programs such as “The Jerry Springer Show” and the WFW and New World Order, both professional wrestling organization “sporting” events, must have some kind of effect on the behavior of children and teens. The wrestling superheroes are violent and verbally abusive.

A recent NBC program illustrated how these wrestling events are staged — even when they shove an elderly woman to the floor. Unfortunately, people of all ages find this funny and entertaining and children tend to imitate their heroes. You need only observe kids on the playground to see this type of behavior acted out.

I would be curious to know if any studies have been done to determine if there is a correlation between the disruptive students and their TV viewing. I would encourage Susan Young to pose this question to the Maine Principals’ Association. Deborah Utterback Bangor