A content-free measure of television program form is developed. This measure is created from a rigorous general theory construction viewpoint. The basic terms of the theoretical measure are created from iconic aspects of programming. These terms are mapped into variables by considering their human information-processing implications. The definitions of the variables are in information theory entropy terms. The variables are used to score 168 television programs, and the results used to factor analyze the variables, creating two independent dimensions called Dynamics and Unfamiliarity. As a validation, the viewing patterns of 149 adolescents on these two dimensions are compared to two other measures of programming content. The information theory dimensions of form are found to detect nonrandom viewing patterns as well or better than either of the other measures of content.

Three general models of the relationship between television viewing and aggressiveness are described: the Facilitation Model, featuring learning or legitimization of aggression from television violence; the Catharsis Model, or the reduction of innate aggressive drives through vicarious participation in television violence; and the Arousal Model, which considers television programming as an agent of arousal, generating a drive toward activity, with the nature of the activity determined by situational factorb. The Arousal Model is further discriminated into an Emotional Arousal Model, in which the agent of arousal is emotional reaction to violent content, and the Form Arousal Model, in which arousal is a result of the cognitive effort involved in decoding programming. The Facilitation, Catharsis, and Form Arousal Models are contrasted on a sample of 597 adolescents. The results indicate independent Facilitation and Form Arousal processes occur. A rather startling result is the finding that levels of aggressiveness can be predicted as well by examining only the form of programming as they can by examining only the violent content. Age and sex differences are associated with different strengths of Facilitation and/or Form Arousal effects, indicating possible socialization or maturation processes affecting the response of adolescents to programming.

Arrows, when used to depict the direction of movement in procedural illustrations, may be ambiguous with regard to the actual direction in which movements should occur. This ambiguity results from problems in translating threedimensional space to the two-dimensional display planes of the printed page and the computer monitor. We discuss sources of the ambiguity and possible solutions.

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