Would happier TV programmes improve mental health?

I love Upstart Crow as well. Unfortunately there’s only one more episode to go for this series. Clever stuff.

University Challenge is my favourite programme. I also usually watch Pointless, quizzing on a different level. I like Doc Martin but I don’t usually like serial dramas, and certainly not things about crime, fictional or factual.

I do watch news if the alternative is property or junk (antiques) programmes during the day. I switch off if it’s too depressing.

We definitely need more sitcoms and good comedy.

I love Doc Martin and I am not alone it seems, it is fun and totally ridiculous sometimes the things that happen in the beautiful Cornish village, but it is easy to watch, and have a laugh, I love all of the characters. Antiques Roadshow is another "innocent" programme, please bring on more.

Very good programme about Cornish poet Charles Causeley on Sunday 1st October.
Upstart Crow is great, very clever and funny. I guess I'll watch the last episode of Liar, 'how not to plot a tv series'!
I enjoy Only Connect and University Challenge. Touching moments and interesting facts in the Antiques Roadshow, I'll never look at Sooty in the same way again.

Yes, Elrel I saw that episode of Antique Roadshow when the expert told of a happy memory regarding Sooty. It was so touching, wan't it?
We really like the Jack Dee comedy "Bad Move" too. Our favourite comedy ever? "The Likely Lads". I also loved "Man About the House" (because of Richard O'Sullivan) and "The Good Life".

Yes I also like doc Martin and there should be more easy viewing programmes like that. I had watched Corrie for years as I thought it was quite funny, but the storylines now are so depressing...to think my kids used to watch it...now, if I had any, I wouldn't let them. It seems we're addicted to dreadful storylines.

We like a bit of doom and gloom as we are Scandi Noir fans. However, when we have had enough of that we watch Kirsty and Phil bantering and pretending to take the sillies they choose houses for seriously. Also, our DD bought us a boxed set of 'Veep' for Christmas and that makes us laugh without fail.

No Sky in our house but I'd watch golf and tennis if there was (sorry sports hating Grans!). I do like Upstart Crow, OC, UniChallenge, Doc Martin, travel programmes and As Time Goes By. I don't know if dismal telly does us any harm but I do feel cheered up by the above.

I like to listen to the news on Radio 4, never watch news on TV, particularly the morning show on the BBC...standards have slipped considerably since Bill Turnbull left. Thank God he has turned up on Classic FM. I never watch reality rubbish and have a book by my side to read for when the ads come on. So all in all I don't watch much TV.

Have just about given up on tv in NZ as the programmes are pretty dire. Pretty much leave it to DH to watch his outback truckers and WW2 things on the history channel, I can hear the sound of heavy artillery in the distance. I sit in the other room with a book. Used to love Coro but they're a miserable lot, why can't they have nice things happen to the people for a change?

Great to know so many of you agree with me! I'm not suggesting there are no cheerful programmes to watch but we frequently choose to watch 'vintage' TV because it seems to leave us in a much happier frame of mind. So, come on, TV schedulers, let's have more of what we enjoy, some funny sitcoms, happy soap narratives and spare us some of the more harrowing details of sickening news events, please!

There is far too much graphic violence. It horrifies me. Any assault which takes place on TV or film could easily just show enough to convey the information that someone has been beaten up .
Too much graphic sex as well to my mind. We can really understand that they are having sex without all this grunting and moaning.

If there’s any graphic violence I switch off, but on the whole I don’t watch the kind of programmes that would have it.

Hello, I have been very busy of late and do not have the time to read all through the thread, but just adding my tuppence worth to the OP ...

YES! The news can be so very depressing and when things are out of our control it can depress us just to keep subjecting ourselves to the knowledge of what is wrong with the world.

I also think 'modern life' and over use of screens, lack of boundary between work and rest because of mobile phones / internet add to pressures.

I want to live in Portwen. Before that I used to want to live in Greendale and have my letters delivered by Postman Pat. Affected by tv? Moi?

I wanted to live in Ballykissangel

It has been said that the best way to find happiness is to help someone - volunteers are always wanted but a lot of us do not want to be tied down and are afraid of letting people down if we get too involved and can't keep it up. . I have just heard of a red cross scheme where you are allocated to a person (eg new mum, lonely old person, disabled person ) and, with lots of help and training, work with them for three months only. This sound like a good idea.
Meanwhile I still laugh at Victor Borge, The Simpsons, the occasional comedy play on radio 4 and a few other things.
Entirely different and again sad in places, I absolutely love Simon Reeve's Russia - perhaps we need to try tight rope walking!

Ban ads that show by rubbing a bit of cream into your aching joints turn you into an energetic what you used to be and wish you still were.

Personally I don't agree that t.v per se is depressing. What with so many choices now, there is always something for everyone. Think back in the day when we only had a couple of channels, it was take it or leave it....sure we had Coronation Street but I would be 'depressed' now if all I had to watch was Corrie and Crossroads ha ha

The majority of people watching tv are adults capable of using a zapper. People should take responsibility for their lives and use it. Not just blame adverts or programmes when they do stupid things.

I can imagine nothing more humiliating than doing wrong and then holding myself up for ridicule by blaming television programmes or adverts for my behaviour. In biblical terms, if I am going to sin I will sin strongly and take responsibility for my actions.

Yes, I know some people are vulnerable and all that and they are excluded from my strictures but the majority are quite capable of making sensible decisions in life and choose not to.