Heavy viewing of televised sports and of television in general were the best predictors of conservative values for high school students.Television programming, along with the family, school, and peer group, has been found by several studies to be a significant agent of socialization for political values, the process by which new generations are integrated into the ongoing culture of a society (see 12). Traditionally, these studies have focused on the overt, cognitive role of news and public affairs programming when dealing with such socialization. More recently, attention has been given to affective, implicit components of socialization as well, especially with regard to programming which is not overtly political and which may transmit such information via incidental learning (22).Sports programming has only recently been considered in this light, despite both theory and empirical studies linking participation in sports to more conservative, traditional, and authoritarian values (1, 2, 3, 7, 10, 22, 23, 27, 32,33, 35, 37, 38). Laboratory experiments have demonstrated the potential of sports programming for the transmission of values, and their behavioral and cognitive impact on young viewers (28, 34). Recently, several authors have speculated on the role television sports plays as a conservatising influence.Real (29), citing such aspects of television sports coverage as strict regulation of activity, emphasis on property and competition, male domination, ethnocentric entertainment themes, and authoritarian structure, states that it acts as "mass propaganda," thereby "sustaining social institutions and lifestyles." Novak (25) states that such coverage "expresses implicitly realities of law, fairness, effort, and spirit," as well as dramatizing "our sense of order," and providing a necessary cultural narrative form, without which the overall culture could "fly apart."Extending this rationale, Goldstein and Bredemeier (16) state that there is "reason to believe that values transmitted by television sports are more con-Robert H.
