So I was told to do an essay about how the media effects people and in this essay there are some real life situations that really caught my attention, though you guys may enjoy it too…
When watching TV there are two different types of people: passive audience and active audience. Passive audience is where the audience does not interact with the media that they consume. So they are injected with messages directly and are easily influenced to do things that the media wants them to do. On the other hand, There are the active audiences too where the audience decides what they want to make out of the text that they consume. The uses and gratification of active audience: entertainment, social interaction, information and personal identification.
The reception analysis model suggests that media content is not passively accepted as truth by audiences. Morley’s (1980) research into how audiences interpreted the content of a well-known. Morley found that audiences were very active in their readings of media content and did not automatically accept the Medias perspective on a range of issues. Morley concluded that people chose to read and interpret media in three different ways:
– Preferred reading: this is what the makers of the media content want us to think and do. For example an advertisement would make this type of person go and consume their service or product straight away after the consumption of the advert.
– Negotiated reading: negotiated is when someone gets affected by a product but do not take action straight away. For example an advertisement will make this type of person think that the product or service they are selling is good but they will consider getting it another time.
– Oppositional reading: Oppositional reading is when the audience it totally against the media contents them are consuming and they do not get affected by it. For example if this person was to watch an advertisement they wouldn’t consider to buy or use the product/ service. Even if they do use the product or service it is for sure not affected by the advertisement they have seen.
Uses and gratification of what we get from the media:
– Diversion: the need to escape from everyday life and to relax away from your ordinary life.
– Personal relationships: people use the media to fulfil their needs to companionship and to form relationships with others (part of joining a social group). Also sharing an interest with others.
– Personal identification: most people use the media to find out information about themselves and finding a sense of style that they can follow and represent themselves as.
– Surveillance: using the media to find out what’s going on around us and around the world in general. This will be sources such as the news, magazines and etc.
The hypodermic needle theory is the belief that there is a direct correlation between the violence and anti-social behaviour displayed in media related content and violence and anti-social behaviour displayed in real life. This theory also advocates that younger people (children and teenagers) are more vulnerable meaning that they are more likely to be influenced by media content. This theory was backed up by a psychologist named Bandura (1963). Bandura carried out an experiment where he exposed young children to a violent cartoon of a doll being attacked by a mallet. After the children had watched the cartoon they had displayed the exact behaviour shown on the cartoon. They concluded that media content could lead to imitation or a copycat violence.
A real life situation that backs up this theory would be the Jamie Bulger case. Jamie was a 2 year old victim who was abducted by two 10 year olds (Jon Venables and Robert Thompson). Jamie Bulger had gone missing from a shopping centre in Bootle on a Friday. Jamie’s body was found on a railway embankment two days later. Justice Morland sentenced both children to eight years but then increased there sentence to 10 years. The two 10 year old had been influenced by watching a film called ‘Child Play 3’. The two 10 year’s olds had imitated a scene from the movie on the 2 year old Jamie. In one of the scenes the victim was splashed with blue paint all over his face. The same situation had then been reacted on Jamie Bulger only with red paint instead. Mr Justice Morland (Trial Judge) had stated – “It is not for me to pass judgment on their upbringing, but I suspect exposure to violent video films may in part be an explanation.”
It has actually never been proven that the two 10 year olds had watched ‘Childs Play 3’. However, the media had suggested that with the imitation of one of the scenes that they should cover up the situation with the idea of the two children being influenced by the movie. There was a psychologist named Gauntlett (2008) who was totally against the study of Bandura. Gauntlett argued that people especially children do not behave as naturally under laboratory conditions as they would in their everyday life. He also believed that children’s media habits are generally controlled and influence their parents.
Critiques of the hypodermic needle theory have developed of the imitation-desensitisation model, for example some media sociologists claimed that media violence can actually prevent real-life violence. For example: Fesbach and Sanger (1971) found that screen violence can actually provide a safe outlet for peoples aggressive tendencies. This is named as catharsis. They suggest that watching an exciting film releases aggressive energy. Another critique of the hypodermic needle theory Young (1981) argued that when viewers see the effects and consequences of violence especially after the victim is in pain they are less likely to commit violence acts.
Newson’s report led directly to increased censorship (examination of movies, shows, computer games). This led for the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) age certificates. The BBFC also came under increasing pressure to censor films released to British cinemas by insisting on the film makers making cuts relating to bad languages, scenes of drug use and violence.
Television was also affected by this climate of censorship. All the television channels agreed on a 9 o’clock watershed. This means that all of these channels were not allowed to show any programmes that use bad language or contain scenes of sexual or violent nature before 9 o’clock. Television channels often resorted to issuing warnings. Televisions had to be careful with what they had to broadcast by beeping out bad language and cutting out inappropriate scenes.
Another believer ‘Gerbner (2002)’ said that he sees a cause effect between screen violence and real-life violence. For example Jeffery Dahmer was an American serial killer who committed the rape, murder and dismemberment of 17 men and boys between 1978 and 1991. He was also involving in necrophilia and cannibalism where he had eaten one of his victims heart and later describing that it had a beef like taste. Dahmer was suffering from a borderline personality disorder. One of his victims managed to escape from the hands of Jeffery Dahmer. Tracy Edwards put an end to Jeffrey Dahmer’s killing and raping spree. He said that Jeffrey had persuaded him to come home with him and do some nude photography and in exchange he would get money. Once he had arrived at Dahmer’s apartment, Dahmer then led him into the bedroom, where the two sat on the edge of the bed and watched the film ‘Exorcist III’. While watching the movie Edwards said that Dahmer seemed to be rocking back and forth and talking to himself in a low quiet voice where he was repeating the lines from the movie. Sometime later, Edwards said he hit Dahmer in the head and escaped. Dahmer had told a detective that he had watched this movie three times a week for six months. We could see that there was a direct link between the actions of Dahmer and the Serial Killer in the movie. Dahmer had followed the actions of the serial killer in `Exorcist III`. Both serial killers had killed 17 people; both did their killing near a Catholic university. Dahmer also confessed that he had felt the character in the movie had resembled him because he said that the character was driven by evil and so was he.
However, Guy Cumberbatch (2004) looked over 3500 research studies into the effects of screen violence; looking through various media contents such as films, television, videos and computer/ video games. At the end of all of his research Cumberbatch had concluded that there was no conclusive evidence that violence shown in the media influences or changes people’s behaviour.
Desensitisation: Newson argued that the sadist and most violent film, show, games and etc. were too easily accessible to viewers. Newson also noted that teenagers and children are subjected to thousands of killings and acts of violence as they grow up.
McCabe and Martin (2005) argued that imitation was a likely outcome of media violence because it was often portrayed as being heroic. Many young people thought it was acceptable to imitation actions like this because they thought it was a positive impact. – This was called the ‘disinhibition effect’. A real life example that backs up this theory would be an incident in Seattle that just came up. In Seattle the police had arrested a 23 year old man who called himself the Phoenix Jones. Phoenix Jones had went around and pepper spayed people that he thought wasn’t doing the right thing or people that were just fighting in general. Jones who wears a black mask with a yellow striped muscle body suit claimed that he was just trying to stop street brawl. The police had said ‘“Just because he’s dressed up in costume, it doesn’t mean he’s in special consideration or above the law. You can’t go around pepper spraying people because you think they are fighting.” This concludes that even the police have determined that psychological effect of what people think when they watch superhero movies. Phoenix Jones was clearly thinking that he was doing the right thing by imitating movies and also doing the wrong thing but thinking that he is stopping crime.
To conclude I think that the media plays a huge part in people’s lives and influences them to imitate some actions that are violent. However, I think that there is not enough research to prove this. Even before mass media had been introduced there were still violent crimes committed. I think that although media does affect people’s action, there are also other contributing factors to these actions. Just like Cumberbatch had said, there is no proof of evidence that links real life violence to on screen violence.
Television & Photography 