 Video Game Trailer Video Game Trailer  Who’s played this game?  What did you think?

Chapter Outline  History  Theory and Research  Controversies MEDIA IMPACT: Understanding Research and Effects

 Why would anyone care about or even do research on the effects media have on society?

 Early Studies  Concerns about media are as old as media themselves. ▪ Church leaders thought bibles would corrupt society ▪ Parents felt the same about the first novels. ▪ Consistent research on media begin in the 1920s.

Types of Media Research  Payne Fund Studies conducted ▪ 13 separate investigations on the influence movies had on youth behavior  Modeling (Payne Fund Study) ▪ The imitation of behavior from media examples ▪ Parents worry children may pick up antisocial habits from media consumption ▪ Video Clip Clip 2 Clip 3 Video ClipClip 2Clip 3 ▪ Do violent games Increase Violence in Society? ▪ Why/Why not

Would these media influence negative behavior? How?

 Content analyses (Payne Fund Study) ▪ Observers analyze media subject matter ▪ (TV, Magazines, Radio, Web, Newspaper)  Laboratory experiment (Payne Fund Study) ▪ Variables are isolated and observed in a controlled environment

 Survey methods (Payne Fund Study) ▪ Research that relies on questionnaires to collect data  Payne Fund studies as a whole ▪ Instrumental in developing public support for the 1930 Motion Picture Production code

 Random sample ▪ When members of population have equal chance of being selected  Selective exposure ▪ When people seek out messages that are consistent with their attitudes ▪ Where do you get your News, What is your favorite TV show, What type of movies do you like?

Media Research  People’s Choice study ▪ Selective perception ▪ When people with different attitudes interpret the same messages differently  Selective retention ▪ When people with different views remember the same event differently

▪ Opinion leaders ▪ Certain well-informed members of families and neighborhoods ▪ Two-step flow ▪ Process where media effects travel through opinion leaders ▪ From radio and print to the opinion leaders and from them to the less active sections of the population.

 Television and violence ▪ National Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Violence ▪ Found that ▪ Desensitization  Effect of long-term exposure to mass-media violence.  Prevented onlookers from helping victims of crimes

 Powerful effects model,  Media will have an immediate & potent influence on audiences. (Youth acting out scenes after violent movie)  Minimal effects model  Media will have little influence on behavior. ▪ People not changing voting behavior

 Researchers today accept ▪ Mixed effects model, ▪ Sometimes media will have  Powerful effects,  Minimal effects, ▪ Sometimes  A mixture of both.  The mixed-effects model makes the most sense.

▪ Bullet theory ▪ Media effects flowed directly from media to individual. ▪ Multi-step flow, ▪ Effects travel from high to lower level opinion leaders then to us.  Politicians to community leaders to clergy to public ▪ There is no simple answer to how media affects behavior. ▪ The best answer usually is “It depends.”

 Social Science Perspectives  Social learning theory, aka modeling theory,  Social modeling is an important part of socialization, ▪ Where expectations, norms, and values of society are learned ▪ What is an example of being “cool”? ▪ How did you learn what “cool is”?

 Diffusion of innovations theory ▪ Five types of people have different levels of willingness to accept new ideas from the media: 1.Innovators tend to be politically liberal extroverts who are venturesome and eager to try new ideas. 2.Early adopters make quick but informed choices.

Understanding Today’s Theory and Research  Diffusion of innovations theory  Five types of people have different levels of willingness to accept new ideas from the media: Early majority makes careful, deliberate decisions. 4.Late majority tends to be skeptical. 5.Laggards tend to be conservative, traditional & resistant to change.

 George Gerbner’s cultivation theory ▪ States media use will “cultivate” a particular view of the world within users.  Agenda-setting, ▪ Not telling people what to think, but what to think about ▪ Is the main effect of media. Homicide report

Understanding Today’s Theory and Research  Cumulative effects theory ▪ Media messages are driven home through redundancy  Uses and gratification theory ▪ Based on how consumers choose & use media to meet their own needs.