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Do this, think that...or else...

Chapter 10 focused on media and culture theories and making meaning in the social world. Media has helped us form useful expectations of certain situations and possibly, our place in the social world. The two theories focused on were culture centered and meaningful making theories. Culture centered theory looks at culture as a primary means of understanding the social world and the role that media plays in it. It provides different perspectives on how media influences culture and consequences. Meaningful making theory focuses on understanding the way media influences how we make sense of the world.

This chapter also talked a lot about social behaviorism and symbols. Social behaviorism rejected stimulus-response conditioning because human existence is way too complex to be understood through laboratory experiments. It believes that the social environment plays a part in behavior and that’s why behavior cannot be fully observed through controlled experiments. George Herbert Mead said that, “rather than observe rats running through mazes, look at how people learn to play a team sport” because it’s a social unit. Learning how to pay a team sport while playing means you can’t rely on simple mimicry, but rather knowing social roles- such as: catcher, pitcher, batter, etc. Through this, people learn how to play together as a team through feedback. If the audience is booing or clapping, coach’s feedback, the team owner’s feedback (firing; bringing in new players/coaches), and winning versus losing. Mead used the baseball analogy because he thought it was a microcosm of society, meaning that in everyday life, we have different social roles through our interactions with people. But, it depends what type of team the sport is. For little league sports, there is room for different types of innovations, but on a team, such as a professional one, players are expected to adhere to a certain norm. For example, players who have weird stances or swings are encouraged to change that to be more “normal”. So, just like there’s a role for each player in baseball, we have ones in everyday life in different social environments. Think about who you are with friends versus your professor or boss. Would normal behavior around your friends be appropriate or seen as “normal” around your boss?

Mead wanted to find a middle ground between idealists arguing that people are dominated by culture and behaviorists arguing that all human action is a conditioned response to external stimuli. But, isn’t it both? People are dominated by culture- just look at different nations and their people. Think about the people racism and people who were dominated by their own culture that they thought that anyone who didn’t look like them were inferior. Or how most Americans will think of a terrorist being a Middle Eastern man rather than a white American shooting up a black church because the media has conditioned the weak-minded to think that way. Is that not also a terrorist? Why doesn’t the media stick the same label on the white American that was placed on someone from the Middle East?

I think with the popular use of social media, such as Twitter, people are able to see opinions easier. They’re not just getting information from Americans, but people from all over the world. Culture is changing quickly, especially when people use media to relate to each other in different ways.

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“We know what you want”

So, you’ve had a bad day. Your significant other broke up with you and on top of that, you have to go to work tomorrow or you’re fired. How will you possibly serve customers greasy food with a smile on your face knowing that your ex is off snoggling with other people? You order Chinese takeout from that decent place around the corner from the house and decide to snuggle into a fuzzy cover on the couch. What show or movie will make you feel better?

The entertainment theory thinks about how entertainment affects us. James Potter says, “Over time, people have developed strategies to use the media to manage their moods. They learn how to do this by trial and error, so that when they are in a mood they do not like, they know what media and which messages to search out” (Baran & Davis 200). Chapter 7 focuses on audience theories and how we use and receive entertainment. I agree and I think a lot of other people can agree with James Potter. There are certain shows to turn on when your different moods. The characters, the plot, the nice outfits (maybe?) affect your mood. The Office, for example, is a show I turn on to fill the silence or entertain me when I’m eating or mindlessly scrolling through social media after a long day. It not only makes me laugh, but Jim and Pam’s romance makes everybody smile and sometimes cringe. Or Dwight and Angela, if you’re into that…

Do the creators of media shape our media knowing it will affect our moods differently? Of course, which is why there are romance movies showing in theaters on Valentine’s Day or on your television. To be fair, the movies released on Valentine’s Day do have the perfect amount of drama, cries, and gushy moments for the single people. The mood management theory is a predominant motivation for using media to moderate or control moods. Choosing to watch a romance movie is likely a hedonistic motivation, rather than a eudaimonic one. A hedonistic motivation is choosing to watch that romance movie to maintain and/or maximize pleasure and diminishing pain. But sometimes, we watch romance movies to feel the pain. To let it all out. Eudaimonic motivation would be deciding to watch a TED Talk on why being single is okay. It provides an opportunity for insight, self-reflection, and contemplation. When going through a break-up, are your motivations more eudaimonic or hedonistic?

How do you think your interaction with entertainment media is? The uses-and-gratifications approach is studying how people use media and the gratifications sought from it. Aside from getting over my overused example of a break-up, in what other moods do you usually watch a particular program? How do you feel after?

I don’t think the mood management and entertainment theory necessarily apply to just people being in a mood and selecting what to watch, then it maximizing or minimizing their mood, but vice versa. For example, 13 Reasons Why triggered a lot of people. A couple of people I know felt worse after watching 13 Reasons Why than they did before they watched it.

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“That would never happen to me...”

Chapter 6 discussed theories of media and human development in children and adolescents. We’ve all been around family or out in public and have seen children and teens literally consumed by entertainment via technology. Baran and Davis say that by the first day of elementary school, children are watching nearly three hours of TV a day. That’s approximately 21 hours per week of media consuming and influencing young people’s thoughts. How much TV do you think you watched every day as a kid? Think about coming home from school and eating a snack in front of the television or even watching TV during school. Most of us were born before 2000, so we didn’t have as easy access to tablets and smartphones as children today do. How much TV and other forms of entertainment are they watching per day?

The social cognitive theory (Baran & Davis) is learning through interaction with the environment that involves reciprocal causation of behavior, personal factors, and environmental effects. In simpler terms, it’s the theory that we learn from observing others whether that’s observing someone at home, a fictional character on TV, or Kim Kardashian- if that’s what you want to do. Anyways, it makes sense. We see it in kids’ television shows when a kid cheats on a test and then gets in trouble by an authority figure at school, and then the teacher or principal calls home, then the teacher and parents are all disappointed in the kid, so we learn the consequences of cheating through others. A part of the social cognitive theory that I wanted to touch on are aggressive cues.

Aggressive cues are situations or dramatic context that provides information (cues) about when violence is acceptable and against whom. I think this can be seen as both evil and good. Good because little kids and teenagers are finding a voice to stand up to bullies or unwelcome environments- where their safety is being threatened. They see these people as role models at some point because it’s their “favorite character” or “crush” or whatever. I think it’s good for young people to be able to see someone on TV, especially if they can relate to that person in real life, and see how people handle problems. I mean, Beverly Hills, 90210 was a perfect example of trials and errors, I think. Then, there’s the negative effect of aggressive cues, where a kid decides to beat up a bully at school and then gets suspended or expelled from school. Or a teenager decides to stand up for itself and ends up in juvie. These are very serious consequences.

Going back to my favorite show mentioned earlier, Beverly Hills, 90210 (the original one, of course), we see priming effects. Priming effects is the idea that presentations in the media will likely cause people to develop similar thoughts about those things in the real world. If you haven’t watched 90210, please do. It follows them through high school, college, the “real world” and personally, the show taught me a lot of things. For instance, confidence and self-assurance. There were many times where characters had a feeling about a new character or a new situation, like when Brenda was introduced to the LA lifestyle. I think this chapter had a negative connotation to media and I don’t think that’s the case for everything, especially when children and/or teenagers are watching because what if it’s an only child who doesn’t have many friends or someone to teach them about life? Of course, humans created media, so there’s good and bad to it, but in my opinion, there’s a lot of good to social cognitive theory- at least to me.

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FOMO?

Chapter 11 focused on how rapidly the media is changing. A big issue I think journalists and print journalism is facing today. Citizen journalism is the direct involvement of ordinary citizens in news production and distribution, according to Mass Communication Theory: Foundations, Ferment, and Future by Baran and Davis. Even though in the book, citizen journalism is for allowing citizens to join directly into journalism to restore interests and trust, but I don’t see it as that. I see citizens creating blogs, large following bases on social media, and influences within the community and calling themselves journalists. We’ve all seen someone with a large following base using their platform to deliver news, to write their opinion on it, and easily swaying hundreds of thousands of people.

An article by Devon Wijesinghesays that, “journalists still start these discussions, but increasingly, as more people get their news via social media, it’s influencers- people you trust enough to follow- who spread them”. The article continues to talk about how companies will spend a lot of money on public relation firms to represent them, but many companies nowadays have seen how working with influencers, instead of the firms. These influencers usually will deliver the news with “opinions, endorsements, and scorn,” as Wijesinghe says, and I can completely agree with that. The followers see this super, relatable person who shares the same beliefs as them and I think it makes their beliefs feel right and stronger. I think people are easily influenced and influencers are producing some of the same effects of journalists.

This chapter also talks about Internet addiction, and FOMO (fear of missing out). Internet addiction is spending 40 to 80 hours per week online. FOMO is the inability to disengage from social media for fear of missing out. I know a lot of people who don’t have cable, but rather use streaming services, such as Netflix and Hulu. Those services don’t have news, so I know a lot of people go online to find their news. Many more people even use social media for their news- I do. Unless someone clicks on the explore or discover tab, then most of the news received is from what people retweet or engage with, which will most likely be that person’s shared beliefs because we usually follow people who we have mutual interests with. I think online that people have a form of explanatory news, where people are getting the conspiracies from people’s opinions and getting the “why” of why something happened.

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Week 9...hmm...

This week’s material was focusing on media effect theories and how we use mass communication to shape our everyday lives. The one that stuck out to me the most was spiral of silence. The literal definition of spiral of silence from Mass Communication Theory: Foundations, Ferment, and Future says that it’s the idea that people holding views contrary to those dominant in the media are moved to keep those views to themselves for fear of rejection. In a simpler explanation, spiral of silence is keeping silent on certain issues for fear of rejection or isolation because of your opinion. It’s a product of the bandwagon effect and what the majority feels is socially acceptable.

I actually chose to do my final project on spiral of silence because I noticed how common it is. Even just being in class and asking friends, the majority opinion are freely able to express their ideas and opinions in such a strong manner, whereas the people who hold opinions separate from the majority keep quiet. A friend of mine was afraid to speak up against his religion for fear of being shunned by his family and friends. We even see it on social media (mass communication) where someone’s past is brought up or someone’s opinion differs from the mass, and people will “cancel” that person, unless the canceled person apologizes and changes their behavior- and sometimes, that isn’t enough. When did it become ok for human beings to play God or the ultimate judge?

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Personalized and dramatized news has some effect on spiral of silence. Personalized news helps people to identify with other people who support their view on political and social issues. Incorporating an emotional story that supports the person’s viewpoint helps evoke a reaction. For example, when Fox shows a little boy wearing a MAGA hat getting attacked by liberals versus CNN covering the Jussie Smollet story where he allegedly was attacked by MAGA supporters. Both of these incite an emotional, usually violent and negative response to other side. This carries into spiral of silence because now, the “Fox v. CNN” people are enraged and disgusted with the other supporters’ behavior. Even being a journalism major, people will ask me, “Fox or CNN”?

I personally don’t like the idea of Fox vs. CNN. I don’t like news with people’s opinions in it. I think as a journalist, people should deliver the truth- the news, with no bias and let the people make their opinions for themselves because unfortunately, most people are easily swayed. The media intrusion theory says that the media has intruded and taken over politics and thus, politics have become “corrupted” (as if it wasn’t corrupt before). Nevertheless, the media intrusion theory does hold some truth, in my opinion. Some people find their news from one source only or even through social media and social media user’s opinions. I once met someone who talked so strongly about their hate for Donald Trump (when he was first running for President). Curiously, I asked why that person didn’t like Trump so much, and that person’s response? “I don’t know but people on social media hate him”.