It is widely held view that art imitates life. However, there exists an actual sense in which art is imitated by life. The power and influence of the media ensures that what is seen, heard and experienced in and through the media influence the behavior of teenagers whether they are conscious of it or not. It is clear that media is the one thing that is almost inseparable from the lives most teenagers. Teenagers are naturally curious. Faced with a multitude of choices and challenges, they often look for direction and guidance on how they can live their lives in today's society .As such, they are particularly susceptible to the media messages of behavior as acceptable, unacceptable, or normal. Since large parts of these messages are engrafted
Media is a very powerful tool, which can lead teenagers on their journey through life. This has invariably created tension between parents who have positive expectations for their teenagers and teenagers who view such expectation as hopelessly out- dated. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the influence of media on teenagers, especially how the media shapes the behavior of teens.
The literature on the influence of media on teenagers is vast and most of them have focused on the negative impacts. They seem to advance the view that the way youth react to situations, or their mode of thinking is wholly based on the effect of the media, particularly television and movies, music, videogames, and the internet. Youth in sense represents the age group between 13 and 20. The outcome of media influences has largely been negative, especially since the above forms of media have negatively influenced the behaviors and sexuality of the
Strasburger, V., & Donnerstein, E. (1999). Children, Adolescents, and the Media: Issues and Solutions. Pediatrics, 103(1), 129-139.
Imagine what the world would be like if when people came home from school or work, they were not able to sit in front of their television and watch their favorite shows. This would be hard to think about considering that not a day goes by that people don’t use some form of media. Media is used to obtain information and watch entertainment. There are many forms of this, and some include newspapers, the Internet, television, and so much more. While there are obviously many great benefits to the growth of media, there are some undeniable and harsh downsides. “In a study on fifth graders, 10 year old girls and boys told researchers they were dissatisfied with their own bodies after watching a music video by Britney Spears or a clip from the TV show “Friends”" (Sanders). This is only one of the many disturbing statistics about the effects that media can have on people. An extensive amount of research and studies have been done over this topic, and it is very evident that media influence has greatly affected society and its peoples’ behaviors in a negative way.
Clark, C, Ghosh, A, Green, E, Shariff,N. (n.d) Media Portrayal of Young People – impact and influences. [Internet], UK, Young Researcher Network. Available from: [Accessed 2nd January 2012]
Van Evra, J. (2007). School-Age Children, Impact of the Media on. In Encyclopedia of Children, Adolescents, and the Media (pp. 739-742). Retrieved from Gale Virtual Reference Library database.
Victor .C, Wilson J, Jordan. A. Children, Adolescents, and the Media. (2009)second ed. California: SAGE publication,. 12-193. Pediatrics, , 958-961. Retrieved April 12, 2014.
The media, including television programming, cartoons, film, the news, as well as literature and magazines, is a very powerful and pervasive medium for expression. It can reach a large number of people and convey ideas, cultural norms, stereotypic roles, power relationships, ethics, and values. Through these messages, the mass media may have a strong influence on individual behavior, views, and values, as well as in shaping national character and culture. Although there is a great potential for the media to have a positive and affirming effect on the public and society at large, there may be important negative consequences when the messages conveyed are harmful, destructive, or violent.
Although most of our media appears to be superficial and meaningless fluff, violence and chit chat, it is also a source of education, humor and non-violent entertainment. Both salesmen and individuals wishing to promote various things have at some point made use of the different forms of the media. They have used the media to promote what people should wear, eat, do and even value. The media informs us what is occurring around the world and how to react to the events shown. The affects of media will vary with a child’s age and stage of development. (Barbour, Barbour & Scully, 2008)
The adolescent stage must be the subject of the research, in that preliminary research suggests that in the adolescent stage of life, important social aspects are being noticed and formed, especially by way of media, while looking to family for social information or influence diminishes (Arnett, 1995). In researching the effects of media on adolescent views of relationships, one must first research if scholars have yet studied and answered if the media has any relationship or effect on adolescents at all. In the research conversation of media influence on adolescents, it has been found that there are five uses of media by adolescents, including entertainment, high sensation, coping, identity formation and youth culture identification (the two latter uses will be highlighted later in this paper) (Arnett, 1995). With this, adolescent’s use of media for a number of purposes is evident and has been established for some time. Moreover, research suggests that U.S. adolescents spend six to seven hours per day using media, with half of that time devoted to television/film (L’Engle, Brown, & Kenneavy, 2006). Furthermore, many studies have found that heavy television/film viewing does positively correlate with effects on an individual’s beliefs, attitudes, and perceptions (Shrum, Wyer, & O 'Guinn, 2009). Professor and Researcher Dr. George Gerbner coined and introduced cultivation theory into this communicative conversation. The cultivation theory is defined as the “independent contributions television /film viewing makes to viewer conceptions of social reality (Gerbner, 1998). The cultivation theory describes and has both constructed a platform research in this area as well as prove that me...
The Media Practice Model, originated by Steele and Brown in their initial 1995 study on adolescent behavior, uses three of five key concepts to characterize how adolescents shape their own lifestyles in pertinence to the media: Selection, Interaction, and Application. (Steele, 1999, p.334) The effects of mass media on adolescent life practices is exceptionally important to social work research and practice because teens, similarly to adults, are influenced greatly by the media. Unlike adults, however, adolescents lack the experience and knowledge to understand that much of the media is fabricated that life practices that are detrimental to one’s health should not be influenced as greatly by the
Their parents and caregivers continue to hold influence over this development, but noted differences are noted. Both children and adolescents are affected by technology advances and exposed to this on a daily basis. Media also shapes children and adolescents view their world. Media influences fashion defines beauty and encourage upholding the beliefs and values of the dominant culture. The noteworthy differences in modern youth culture are their need for immediate gratification, absence of long-term thinking about life and the world, expecting bail-outs with consequences and focusing on appearance rather than
Mokeyane, K. Nola. "Media's Positive & Negative Influence on Teenagers." Everyday Life. Globalpost, Web. 21 Jan. 2010.
Media technologies are becoming an important aspect of today’s society. Each and every day, people interact with media of many different forms. Media is commonly defined as being a channel of communication. Radio, newspapers, and television are all examples of media. It is impossible to assume that media is made up of completely unbiased information and that the media companies do not impose their own control upon the information being supplied to media users. Since many people use media very frequently, it is obvious to assume that it has affects on people. According to the text book Media Now, "media effects are changes in knowledge, attitude, or behavior that result from exposure to the mass media," (386). This leaves us with many unanswered questions about media and its influences. This paper will look at how the effects of media are determined and explore the main affects on today’s society - violence, prejudice, and sexual behavior.
Sexual activity in the mass media is another negative influence on teenagers. The first example is early sexual intercourse. According to Stockwell, a research shows that teenagers who are exposed to a lot of sexual content on television are more to likely to have sex by 16 years of age than those with limited exposure.
Young people especially the teenagers are sensitive and receptive to learning new things. The media provides more than they can handle. Access to different programs, shows, and movies affect the manner that the teenagers behave. Today, it is unfortunate to say that the media is becoming more sexual and violent than the older days, resulting in similar behaviors among the teens (Craig, & Baucum, 2001). By watching programs intended for the adults, teenagers are drifting even further. They start behaving like adults without the prerequisites of becoming one. This means that they have contents that do not match with their ages. And then terrible things begin – increased college dropouts, teenage pregnancies, and increased cases of suicides. Some teenagers who had bright future ahead of them will
The mass media has played a key role in shaping people’s lives. The modern society’s use of mass media including TV, radio, newspaper, as well as print media has largely influenced people’s ideas regarding themselves and the society at large. This is evident from their behavior towards themselves and their community as well as their treatment of the environment. While some experts believe that the media is to blame for most of the negative behavioral traits among the active members of society, the majority agree that the media makes people understand and develop a positive sense of association with their society within which they live, making it easy for them to identify and get their role in it.