Television And The World Essay Research Paper — страница 2

out there. Wisocki (1982) found among 78 college students, that holding sexually stereotypic views of themselves was positively associated with watching programs with stereotypical sex-role portrayals, but not with over all television watching. Which proves that if sex is not on television views of young adults will be more thought out and be their own beliefs rather than what the media wishes for them to believe. Many will argue the characters on television and their behaviors can affect the knowledge of their younger viewers. Bandura (1977) Children admire actors from their favorite shows and movies and very often will do anything in their power to look and act like them. Boys learn at a very young age that to be a man one must fight and kill in shows that they are viewing.

Incidents in recent years have even led to deaths. An example would be in 1991 a young boy in Connecticut watched an episode of “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” and then went outside only to beat the neighbor child up until he died. When asked why he did he said because the ninja turtles did. This could be the same reason why teenagers decide to have sex. When they see such popular teen shows as “Party of Five” and “Beverly Hills 90210″ having sexual encounters and not having any sexual transmitted diseases or a pregnancy then they to believe that having sex can lead to almost nothing bad. If shows that aim them selves to the younger audience, would take a stand and incorporate sexual education into the program then teens would be more likely to be safer when deciding

to or when having intercourse. Research done by Downing (1974) found that 29.5% of women on day time television to be playing the role of housewife. A study by Signorelli (1989) found that women are also portrayed as younger than their men counterparts and most are almost always under the age of fifty. Children can receive all the wrong messages when watching shows with these types of situations. A study done by Cordua (1981) showed preschool children and first grade students a video showing a female doctor and a male nurse. They found that the majority of the children recalled the male as the doctor. He concluded that one of the most difficult tasks of counterstereotyping is to dissuade children out of their beliefs of the roles of males in our society. Singer and Singer (1981)

conducted more research with preschool aged girls. This study showed that young girls are now all emulating the behaviors of Wonder Women, Charlie?s Angels, and Bionic Women. This shows that young girls now have role models to look up to that are doing the same types of things the males are doing in the media. Dominick (1992) in a study showed a noticeable consistency in gender roles published between 1970 and the early 1990?s. Results showed that more women on television in the 1980?s were portrayed as working in contrast to the women of the 1960?s and the 1970?s. However women are still underrepresented and still appear to hold a lower status position than men. Television?s impact on children is largely based on the fact that the most American children spend a great deal of

time in front of the television. The average high school graduate will have been exposed to as many as 350,000 commercial messages. Alder (1980). Some critics feel that any type of advertising towards children is unfair and unacceptable. They say this because children should not be harmed or exploited because of advertisements. In April 1978, the FTC announced a rule regarding television advertising towards children. (Federal Trade Commission 1978). Certain characteristics of product presenters notably their sex, race, occupation, or social behavior, can contribute to children learning social stereotypes. Alder (1980). Children do notice that women are always selling the dish soap or the laundry detergent and if they are not selling a cleaning product their parading around in a

bikini selling beer to a group of hollering men. Advertisements also have a tendency to group certain races with their own race and do interchange races very often. Children?s commercials even are guilty of this. In commercial?s for cabbage patch dolls the African American girl is always seen playing with the African American doll, while the white girl is always playing with the white doll. This is teaching children segregation rather than equality. Children have the ability to take in all the stereotypes that they have seen and these beliefs could be with them the rest of their lives because of the influence it had on them at such a young age. The Internet offers children of all ages to view pornography with the push of a few keys. As society becomes more dependent on computers,