WASHINGTON - Sometimes the numbing effect of TV can be helpful. Especially if you're a kid being stuck with a needle at the hospital. Researchers confirmed the distracting power of television — something parents have long known — when they found that children watching cartoons suffered less pain from a hypodermic needle than kids not watching TV. Especially disturbing to the author of the scientific study was that the cartoons were even more comforting than Mom. While it's good to have a powerful distraction for children getting painful medical procedures, it is also troubling "because we have demonstrated the excessive...
