Idea Post #3: Spring Semester

Idea Post #3: Spring Semester

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Media Influence

Quotes:

"...I rant about it in the book, too, about the sort of 'Sex and the City' world. That really bothers me that Samantha, who is one of sickest characters on television becomes a role model...It's such a divorce from reality. I treat Samanthas all the time. They're horrible, miserable human beings who will suffer with their behavior...Then to put her up as a role model becomes confusing, people start to feel flawed. They engage in behavior that's supposed to be cool and good and don't feel right..." 

  - Dr. Drew Pinsky

"Television exposure during adolescence has also been linked to subsequent aggression in young adulthood.  A 17-year longitudinal study concluded that teens who watched more than one hour of TV a day were almost four times as likely as other teens to commit aggressive acts in adulthood."  

-The Kaiser Family Foundation, TV Violence Fact Sheet, Spring 2003

Source for both: 

 Various Authors. "Media Violence, Sex, and Profanity ." Parent's Television Council, n.d. Web. 15 Feb 2011. <http://www.parentstv.org/PTC/facts/mediaquotes.asp>.

Annotated Bibliography: Lewis, Justin. Constructing public opinion: how political elites do what they like and why we seem to go along with it. Columbia Univ Pr, 2001. Print.

This book is an interesting resource on figuring out how children are influenced.  I like this as a reference because it tells you how media personnel work to construct public opinion. This book is like a guide on the "science" of swaying opinion.  This would be helpful when trying to show how and from where inspiration is received.

Relation: I really feel like this issue addresses where my series is heading.  I feel like after tons of reasearch and contacting people and interviews and unsuccessful photographs, I have finally found what I need to focus on. I am narrowing down the topic of my series where children draw their inspiration and make a point to show that the parent's of these children should want to be those role models.  Researching the topic of "media influence" of course is relevant to my work because I am exploring where inspiration and influence come from in a young child's mind.