However I strongly feel that the effects given by the media are varied according to the age group of the audience: - young children, teenagers and an older generation. Young children are easily influenced by images and ideas that they understand and can relate to, they go to great lengths to be like their favorite cartoon character or favorite TV character, e.g. when Power Rangers came out, every child wanted to be like them and would imitate their moves on one another. Parents would even get them the Power Ranger products such as costumes to help their imaginations be reality, not understanding the effects that this could cause. However this is because small children do not have a very good understanding of the real issues in life, surrounding them, life to them is portrayed in their TV programmes, therefore the producers of children's television have to be extremely careful in what they broadcast, assuming that whatever they broadcast will have a sufficient effect on the children. But it is also extremely important for them to be careful as it their primary time and are uniquely vulnerable to be learning and to be adopting ideas about the world, ' there is the added image of childhood as an age of innocence.' [p16, Brian M.Young: (1990), 'Television Advertising and Children.'] For this reason they need protection from picking up wrong behavior and attitudes, especially from the way in which media can manipulate children with their sophisticated techniques. Another fear is that if the media puts forward a lot of violence, there is also a possibility that children will grow up thinking that the world is violent too or may see the world as a mean and scary place. It may also lead them to think that in the real world these violent acts are normal and are to be expected. 'If violence is the norm on television, how does this influence the child's opinion of the use of violence in the world of real people as a legitimate means of gratification, or solving problems, or as an end in itself?' [p131, Brian M.Young: (1990), 'Television Advertising and Children.']
Another age category that I mentioned was teenagers, who by now have established the rights and wrongs of the world, but can be influenced by images of rebellion, freedom, etc, all images that can relate to violence, also images that are different from their everyday life's. In the case of the older generation it is my belief that certain individuals have a negatively affected violent mind before they watch a particular programme or film, or conform in any type of media portraying violence, and the images or visions portrayed can spark off ideas in their heads encouraging them to act negatively.
However for the audience to respond to the media, the media needs to gain the audiences attention, and as mentioned before, persuasion is one of the key factors and one of the most dangerous ones to do this. The means of persuasion is used by selecting the right character of the speaker, this is so that the audience must be persuaded to trust the speaker, leading the audience to listen and take in the information that the speaker is giving. The trust may come from the speaker being a famous and a well known person, it may come from the speaker being a well known role model, or this trust may come from someone who's experiences can relate with the target audience. This can also been seen as dangerous, as the audience may or will pick up ideas, ways, cultures, attitudes etc from the media that they trust. An example is shown from the War of the Worlds, where the Orson walls was broadcasted in such a way that people believed it was true. It was when a story of aliens would invade was put forward with great realism, and the Californian people started to committee suicide in point of fear. In this case the audience's trust was gained by giving proof of the argument, in other words, facts.
Thousands of studies have been performed to prove that violent influences do exist, and to find out the way it does exist. Unfortunately it has been proven that children watch an average of three to four hours of television daily, and much of this television watching has some sort of violence within it. It was found that media violence affected children by ' increasing aggressiveness and anti-social behavior, increasing their fear of becoming victims, making them less sensitive to violence and to victims of violence and increasing their appetite for more violence in entertainment and real life.' [Vol.95.No.6, (June 1998), 'http://www.aap.org/advocacy/childhealthmouth/media.htm'] It was also found that media violence on television is on the increase and it has been proven that the average American child ' will witness over 200,000 acts of violence on television including, 16,000murders before age of eighteen.' [Center for Media and Public Affairs, (1992), 'http://www.babybag.com/articles/amavid.htm'] This is because the media portray normalization in carrying and using weapons and glamorize them as a source of personal power. Another fact that has proven is that watching violence on TV also leads to or is in connection with the increase of tobacco and alcohol usage, intake and younger outbreaks of sexual activities.
The internet is furthermore seen as hunting and trapping ground for the child molesters and pedophiles, who have moved from the playground to the internet as if offers them anonymity. One case where this was proven was the Soham's murder, where two girl's aged eleven and twelve went on to a chat room, had a conversation with someone they did not know, and then out went to meet the person. Unfortunately from that day they went missing for two weeks, till the bodies were found. Further investigation found that they were sexually assaulted and then were killed.
Violent video games are also of concern as now there is a great popularity in the digitized human images, which youngest want to be like, and will once again imitate there moves causing aggression towards one another. This is likely to lead them to engage in real life violence. In video games, it is shown that the majority of women characters have a less dominant role. In the 'Duke Nukem' game a negative stereotype of women has been put forward as prostitutes. The game encourages players to participate in violence against them, by killing them for the reward of 3D players. This game presents them as sex objects. The players get awarded for harassing women by throwing cash as them. The women are shown as powerless and are shown pleading to be killed.
As shocking as is sounds, it is true to say that music also contains elements and promotes violent influences to the way we think and act. This is on the increase as parents do not always know what lyrics are contained in the music that their children listen to, allowing a higher chance for the child to consume and use bad language. An example of this of this is from the well known rap artists, Snoop Doggy Dog and Dr. Dre whose music is known widely and are famous for lyrics which contain guns, rape and murder.
Pornography is also another genre that is targeted as a type of media which is most likely to effect women in a violent manner. Studies have proved that pornography has a numbing effect, allowing males to sexual assault without realizing the suffering that they will cause the victim. 'A series of 1988 studies of prisoners reveals that 86% of rapists admit to regular use of pornography, with 57% admitting actual imitation of pornography scenes in commission of sex crimes'. [ p214, Linz, D. and Donnerstein,E (September 30 1992), ' Research Can Help Us Explain Violence and Pornography'-The Chronicle of Higher Education'] It has been suggested that violence against women can be caused by the way that women are portrayed in the media. It is true to say that the film, television, video, computer games and music all portray women as victims of violence or as sexual objects. This is a great danger in society, as this has influenced society to view and treat women the ways in which they are portrayed. Rising evidence imply that men who constantly watch films in where women are shown in sexually degrading or violent genres and themes, become less disturbed by violence against women, making them less sympathetic towards female victims.
Many techniques can be used to control and influence the ways in which we think and act. One way of influencing can be put through the technique or theory of propaganda and the hypodermic needle/magic bullet. Propaganda is a persuasive communication used by government, parties and pressure groups to get society to change their attitudes and opinions, or to reinforce our attitudes and opinions, ' communications designed to gain people's approval, or, as we might say today, to capture their hearts and minds, concerning some policy or program.' [p357, Defluer/Dennis, Chapter 11, (1999), 'Understanding Mass Communication' Fifth Edition] Propaganda is usually associated with mass media exploitation by dictators. Propaganda plays on our emotions and fears, and we believe propaganda tells us what to think. An example of this is the Nazi propaganda, where they saw and used film and radio's a means of extending the influence of demagogy, deliberately depriving the nation of independent thoughts, for aim of controlling and producing predictable behavior. The hypodermic needle theory also known as the magic bullet, is an idea that the mass media are so powerful that they can inject high idea's and beliefs within one's individual mind, or a magic bullet can accurately target at an audience 'who irresistibly fall down when hit by the bullet, in other words, the maker of the media messages can get us to do whatever they want us to do.' [effects.htmleffects.htm] However it was concluded by all studies and research that there is not a magic bullet to tell us what to do, though there are minimal effects and large groups lean towards minimal effects.
The 'Empirical Studies and Minimal Effect' studies did a number of experimental researches, using different types of methods. Psychology and sociology methods were used to observe and then ask questions to small groups of people, after showing them clips of violence. One experiment that was done by Katz and Lazarsfield was the ' two step flow'. This term was given to describe their observation that the media message went from the media to the opinion leaders, then to the audience. Their research demonstrated that media effects are 'mediated by the pattern of our social contracts'. [effects.htmleffects.htm] Their conclusion was that the media have limited effects, however experiments also conducted by Lazarfield and Bandura had shown that the audience did adopt violent behavior. Some of these experiments where when clips of children being abused and being abusive then being rewarded, where shown to children. Then they observed the children to see who picked up on this, and recorded that children did become violent. Another experiment undertaken was when a mallet was given to the teachers, and found that when they became frustrated, aggressive behavior came out on a dummy clown. Also they did social surveys and questionnaires, to find a pattern on behavior. They did not find much, but two main factors became known, that in cities people who had TV's had an increase of crime then those who did not have TV's.
However as I mentioned before that the empirical studies argued that the media effects were limited as they did not find a strong correlation. The idea also came about that the audience uses the media in the theory of ' uses and gratification's. What this means is that the audience turn to the media to seek gratification of a variety of needs or even approach this idea of 'filter the media,' where the media is used to reflect the audiences own opinions. So these theory argued that they are just a social factor to reinforce what the audience already believe and allow them to use the media for their own means. Also it was argued that even though children can act or talk violently to some extent after seeing certain material, did not mean that they were going to think or act violently always, as some time later this experience is over.
In my opinion a fair argument to state is that the media has both, long term and short term effects. Some can agree that the media can cause immediate effects, and other can argue in the situations of beliefs and ideas, it can be assumed, that their will be long term effects. Indirect influences can also be produced that can take effect later on in one's personality, with agenda setting influencing this, where the media tells us not what to think but what to think about.
During this essay I have covered a range of topics in connection with violence. In my essay I have concentrated on three main aspects, I have defined the term ' media'; I have talked about the different techniques used to influence the way one acts and thinks, and I have discussed the different types of media that influences this. I have produced this with relevant evidence in a form of quotes and example of past situations.
Bibliography
Curran, James and Seaton, Jean (1997) Power without Responsibility, The press and Broadcasting in Britain 5th Edition
Defleur/ Dennis (1994) Understanding Mass Communication 5th Edition
Dickinson, Harindranath, Linne (1998) Approaches to Audiences A Reader
Everette E. Dennis (1989) Reshaping the Media, Mass Communication in an Information Age
Linz, D. and Donnerstein,E (September 30 1992), Research Can Help Us Explain Violence and Pornography The Chronicle of Higher Education
Lull, James (1995) Media, Communication, Culture A Global Approach
Reuss, Carol (1998) Impact of Mass Media Second Edition, Current Issues
Young, Brian m (1990) Television Advertising and Children Clarendon Press. Oxford
Vol.95.No.6, (June 1998), http://www.aap.org/advocacy/childhealthmouth/media.htm
Center for Media and Public Affairs, (1992), http://www.babybag.com/articles/amavid.htm
[effects.htmleffects.htm]
