Blog's Visits

1) http://myo-portrayals-groups.blogspot.com/

Media Portrayals of Groups in Society – Gender Stereotyping and White Privilege

What I was able to see in this blog, is the media portrayal of specific groups and genders. The Issues were explained in detail. It has covered many issues regarding media stereotyping.
Recommend visiting the blog.

2) http://mariamsi.blogspot.com/

Negative Influence of Popular Music on Youngsters

In this Blog, music and its influence was discussed. The Blog is very interesting to read, since there is usually not much information on the internet about music and their lyrics. There are good examples of articles and event regarding violence and music. Good description, on how music is perceived in today's society.

3) http://sexinmassmedia.blogspot.com/

This Blog discusses the issues of sex in the media. New trends among teenagers, and how media portrayals sex, also it discusses the consequences of such portrayals, such as teenage pregnancy. Issues such as sex in advertisement and internet pornography are also covered subjects.
Recommend visiting the blog.

4) http://hatesites-tamta.blogspot.com/

This Blog discussed the issues of Hate sites on the Internet. Examples of affects where mentioned and the problems regarding those hate sites were covered. Also issues of further approaches regarding those web sites have been given.

5) http://meidapeto.blogspot.com/

This Blog approaches the problems of media and privacy issues. It focuses on whether we have any privacy in today's society heaving all this exposure to media. Also the Topic of the growth if Internet is described, and how it affects us and our privacy. Well developed Blog. With many good information's to cover this Topic.

6) http://mediaandsociety2010.wordpress.com/

This Blog I find very interesting, since it takes on the issues of social networks, and their influence on the society. The reason why I believe it is interesting, and has an important value, is because these social networks are growing with each day, it becomes more popular and has more subscribers then ever. But not much is know about their negative affects. Very well organized blog, with many articles to look at, clear point on the topic of the blog.
Recommend visiting the blog.

Why I believe this issue is important; Introduction

Violence in the media is not an unknown subject in today’s society, I believe that the Media violence and people’s violent behaviour have a link, and this is where the media violence becomes an important issue, which then creates a problem in the society. Therefore the reason why I choose this theme to work with is because violence and the media are very powerful, and my purpose is to show these negative effects, and why it’s so powerful.

The media violence can be divided into categories, because when we talk about media violence it is important to distinguish what media, and what target group this violence is affected. I specifically choose to write about children in the age group of 8-18 years old, and the medium I will focus on are violent movies, TV shows, and video games. I do believe that it is not only the age group of 8-18 that is affected, but under the age of 8 it is rather difficult to have access to these violent movies, video games, and also the interest in violence is not as strong at a younger age. Looking at the older age people have a less manipulative, and can distinguish between fiction and reality (even though some people above the age of 18 are just as simple to influence).

As I mentioned above I believe the real issue with violence and children, is for them to distinguish between what they see on TV, movies, and video games, usually children have a lack in after school activities and hobbies, or usually parents are too busy to be spending time with their children, and the children turn to their video games, and TV, usually spending hours doing so. But who is to blame, The Parents, the industry that provides these violent games, movies, and TV shows, or the media itself? Why does none of them want to take any blame for any violent behaviour in children? If we hear news about something a child did it as an act of what he saw in a movie, who should we blame? Is it even of any importance? In my blog I want to focus on this topic, and see how violent these mediums are, and also look into how it can influence a child and its surroundings.

FashionablyGEEK.(2009,January29).Violent Video Games Can Give You An Excuse To Be Crazy [Image].Retrieved from http://fashionablygeek.com/t-shirts/violent-video-games-can-give-you-an-excuse-to-be-crazy/

Love to know.(2006,July7).Kids and Guns [Image]. Retrieved from: http://kids.lovetoknow.com/wiki/Kids_and_Guns

The negative effects of media violence on children

Children are the future, we believe. But what future will it be, if we teach children the wrong values. A child is being exposed to violence every day, and the violence has no restrictions, moreover media is becoming more violent, and made as real as possible by the producers, which do not estimate or even consider the negative effects, it is mostly about sales and the levels of viewers.

If we talk about the negative effects we need to specify what they are, let’s have a look at what those might be. If we see violence in TV, Video Games and Movies, the most immediate effect is fear. This fear can be an adrenaline rush, but can also cause anxiety in real life. A child might not understand the connection and process of violence, and might be damaged by this image for a long time. Children are more effected, the older the child, the more he understands the realistic dangers.

Other negative effects can be seen in the perceived reality, when the content is perceived to be real, violence had a stronger effect. In the 1960 a couple of researches have been done on nearly 900 8-year olds, and have kept in contact with them, until they were almost 30 years old, the researcher Eron Huseman, has found that the children that were watching more violent TV, had shown a more aggressive behaviour.

One of the main problems in children watching media violence is the glorified violence. Glorified violence can be extremely dangerous, since many young children urge to be glorified in their surroundings, and an act of violence might be shown as something great, and brave, and then imitated by the children in their social life. School shootings and violence amongst children had increased, and looking at the content of the violent movies, video games, and TV programs, no surprise.

Violence is shown to the children at a young age; already cartoons have a great deal of violence. Children might not understand the concept of death, and also problems in the violence portrayal are issues such as immortality, in video games, movies, and TV, a character is sometimes shown as immortal, or in the case of video games a character can die and be reactivated over and over again. Many children are in possession of a TV in their bedroom, which gives the parents no ability to follow on what the child is watching. Nowadays it is very simple for children to get access to violent games, movies, and TV programs, and the rating system does not always serve its purpose, with illegal downloading, the rating law looses its effect.

“Experimental studies have all confirmed this correlation; televised violence and the presence of television in American households have increased steadily over the years. In 1950, only 10% of American homes had a television. Today 99% of homes have televisions. Studies reveal that children watch approximately 28 hours of television a week, more time than they spend in school. The typical American child will view more than 200,000 acts of violence, including more than 16,000 murders before age 18. Television programs display 812 violent acts per hour; children's programming, particularly cartoons, displays up to 20 violent acts hourly.” M.D. Eugene V Beresin, Director of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

Looking at the content of movies, video games, and TV programs, even so called Heroes are portrayed as fantasy; a hero can act violent and gets rewarded. This is an example of how the media can create such Heroes, and give children the wrong picture. Also violence can be seen as a way of revenge, and media content can be used as a justification for using violence. One of the effects media violence can have on children is that child will take the violent content as a fact of life. A special concern to experts, regarding video games, is that the children are able to act out the violence, and are not just passive observers.

According to a recent survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 5.9% of high school students carried a gun in the 30 days prior to the survey. Eighteen percent of high school students now carry a knife, razor, firearm, or other weapon on a regular basis, and 9% of them take a weapon to school.

"Violence is like the nicotine in cigarettes." “The reason why the media has to pump ever more violence into us is because we've built up a tolerance. In order to get the same high, we need ever-higher levels. . . . The television industry has gained its market share through an addictive and toxic ingredient." states Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, a former Green Beret and West Point psychology professor.

Media violence has already been taken up as a public policy issue In 1993, a symposium hosted by the C.M. Hincks Institute for Children's Mental Health brought together all of the stakeholders. The industry-based Action Group on Violence on Television (AGVOT) was formed at this symposium and soon after, the Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB) filed with the CRTC a revised, strengthened voluntary code on violence in broadcasting.
The Code's provisions included:
• a prohibition on airing programs that are gratuitously violent and that promote or glamorize violent acts
• a "watershed hour" of 9:00 p.m. before which only violence suitable for adults could be aired
• a promise to develop a program classification system
• a commitment to sensitivity about violence against vulnerable groups, such as women and minorities
• a statement that violence would not be shown as a preferred way of solving problems, or as the central theme of children's programming and that children's programming would not invite dangerous imitation

(Media Awareness Network)

Violence has become a problem by glamorising and downgrading it. As Dave Grossman states, we have build up a tolerance, and therefore the content of the violence needs to be as shocking and real as ever. A child is not capable to understand all the content he is exposed to, and might not be able to estimate the consequences. Unfortunately the reality is that children have easy access to violent content, and are able to work around the law. Here we come back to the question on who should be the one to blame? And what can we do about it? It is important to educate children to this topic, to make them understand the content. It is also a parent’s responsibility, to know what your child is watching, and only allowing a certain limit of television time. "If you're worried about what your kid eats, you should worry about what your kid's watching." Robert Lichter, president of the Center for Media and Public Affairs, a nonprofit research group in Washington, D.C.

Work Cited

1)J. Soltys's Weblog.(2008,November 18).Male Artists Sexist? Females Need To Look In Mirror.[Image]. Retrieved from http://jsoltys.wordpress.com/2008/11/18/male-artist-sexist-females-need-to-look-in-mirror/

2)Media awareness network.(2010).Media Violence - Introduction.Retrieved April 27,2010, from Media awarenedd network website:http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/issues/violence/index.cfm

3)Media awareness network.(2010).Government and Industry Responses to Media Violence.Retrieved April 27,2010, from Media awarenedd network website:http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/issues/violence/govt_industry_responses.cfm

4)Senate Committee on the Judiciary Senator Orrin G. Hatch.(1999,September 14).CHILDREN, VIOLENCE, AND THE MEDIA.Retrieved April 27,2010, from: http://www.indiana.edu/~cspc/ressenate.htm

5)eHow.(2010).Media Violence In The Us.Retrieved April 27,2010, from eHow website:http://www.ehow.com/media-violence-in-the-us/

6)Eugene V Beresin, M.D.(2009).The Impact of Media Violence on Children and Adolescents: Opportunities for Clinical Interventions.Retrieved April 27,2010, from American Academy Of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry website: http://www.aacap.org/cs/root/developmentor/the_impact of_media_violence_on_children_and_adolescents_opportunities_for_clinical_interventions

Recommended web pages

Here I provided some web pages that might be interesting for you to have a look at.

1)http://www.media-awareness.ca

The media awareness web page, discusses the issues of the media in today’s society.
It is a network which provides young people with resources and support regarding the media. What is also very interesting is that people can leave their feedback or contribution to the web page via blog, on their homepage. Not only is it for the young generation, but also parents and teachers have their own space in this network. Why I think it could be a good reason to look at is because it covers interesting topics in the media such as Media Violence, Media Stereotyping, Online hate and so on. In the section of media issues you can always find new information regarding media.

2)http://www.extension.iastate.edu/families/media/pages/resources.html

What I find interesting on this website, are the topics which it covers; Media Violence: Confronting the Issues and Taking Action, The National Institute on Media and the Family, Talking with Kids about the News, and so on. I believe it covers my previous posts, and gives a good source of other links to look at.

3)http://www.nccev.org/violence/media.html

The National Centre for Children Exposed to Violence also covers relevant topics, such as Media violence, school violence, and community violence. It mainly covers the issue of violence itself. The website offers relevant websites to look at, and also supported by statistics.

4)http://www.apa.org/topics/kids-media/index.aspx

The American Psychological Association is more broad then the other wed pages, but also covers a great deal on media violence and the effect on children. The web page has a great deal on researches and talks about the psychological aspect on these issues. Because of that great deal on researches, I believe it is worth heaving a look at.

(2010)Media Awareness Network.Retrieved April 20, 2010 from: http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/index.cfm

(2007)The Impact of Entertainment Media Violence on Children and Families. Retrieved April 20, 2010 from Iowa State University website: http://www.extension.iastate.edu/families/media/pages/resources.html

(2005)NCCEV.Retrieved April 20, 2010 from: http://www.nccev.org/us/overview.html

(2010)American Psychological Association.Retrieved April 20, 2010 from: http://www.apa.org/topics/kids-media/index.aspx

Does media violence lead to real violence, and do video games impair academic performance?

November 11, 2008

This article by Caleb Crain, raises the question, if exposure to violence on TV and video games leads to aggressive behaviour in the real world, also if it does influence their academic performance. This article mentions experiments that were done in the 1960s by Albert Bandura, a well known Psychologist, showing that children tend to mimic violent behaviour they have just seen on screen. This reflects to what I mentioned in my previous posts, that the connection between the behaviour and acts, and the violence on what the children are exposed to, are rather difficult to research, and therefore hard to be scientifically proven, but we can see that children are not aware of the content and the amount of exposure, which then leads to mimicking what they saw on TV or video games.

"Clear evidence that television violence can cause aggressive behaviour." the American Psychological Association.

“Violence on television does lead to aggressive behaviour.” A panel commissioned by the Surgeon General to survey existing research.

This article also mentions the “mean world syndrome” where the violence, can cause children to believe that the world is mean and cruel. Also it mentions a boy that has been exposed to violence at a young age and at the age of 18 was involved in violent crime.

This Article is worth a read, because it talks about many researches that have been done in this field, to prove the connection to violent behaviour and media violence. As we can see there are plenty of examples concerning researches, therefore we can see what a status media violence has become in today’s society, meaning that is has caught our and researchers attention, that violent media exposure on children is a problem.

Find Article on:
http://umichpress.typepad.com/university_of_michigan_pr/2008/11/does-media-violence-lead-to-real-violence-and-do-video-games-impair-academic-performance.html



Crain,Caleb.(2008,November 11).Does media violence lead to real violence, and do video games impair academic performance? .Retrieved April 20,2010, from The University of Michigan Press: http://umichpress.typepad.com/university_of_michigan_pr/2008/11/does-media-violence-lead-to-real-violence-and-do-video-games-impair-academic-performance.html

Flickr.(2006,Dezember 7).Media violence [Image].Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/2006/12/07/

ChallengingMedia.(2006,Oktober 4).The Killing Screens: Media & the Culture of Violence [video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PHxTr-59hE&feature=related

Media Violence May Affect Children's Minds

Exposure to Media Violence May Alter Brain Activity in Nonviolent Children


June 10, 2005

This article by Charlotte E. Grayson Mathis, MD talks about researching the effect on children’s brain activity by watching violent television programs or video games, even if the child had no history of aggressive behaviour.

“Researchers found nonaggressive children who had been exposed to high levels of media violence had similar patterns of activity in an area of the brain linked to self-control and attention as aggressive children who had been diagnosed with disruptive behaviour disorder.” Charlotte E. Grayson Mathis, MD

"This observation is the first demonstration of differences in brain function being associated with media violence exposure," says researcher Vincent Mathews, MD, of the Indiana University School of Medicine, in a news release.

Even though this study shows the link between violent media exposure and brain function differences, Researchers agree that more research is needed to know the exact connection of the violent exposure and behaviour.

"We found high rates of exposure to violent television and video games in teens, but we are just beginning to explore the possible implications of this exposure for brain and behavioural development," says researcher Kronenberger, PhD, of Indiana University,

This study shows that children are exposed to a high violence, researches are being made, even though the researches are still in process, and the connection of the violent exposure and behaviour has not been scientifically proven, we can see from this article, that researches are made, and in any case, a high exposure of violence did impact the children’s brain function.

Access article on Homepage:
http://www.webmd.com/parenting/news/20050610/media-violence-may-affect-childrens-minds


Charlotte E. Grayson Mathis(2005).Media Violence May Affect Children's Minds
Exposure to Media Violence May Alter Brain Activity in Nonviolent Children.WebMD.Retrieved from http://www.webmd.com/parenting/news/20050610/media-violence-may-affect-childrens-minds

Listverse.(2009, October 11).10 More Amazing Facts About Dreams [Image].Retrieved from http://listverse.com/2009/10/11/10-more-amazing-facts-about-dreams/