Television’s affect on Children - a Fantasy Theme Analysis
Azalee Maslow
Fantasy theme analysis is a rhetorical method that analyzes anything from articles about
one person to a movie. This analysis looks at who the people that are involved are, where it takes
place, what the scenes are, the meanings behind the drama, and how is attracts the unconverted.
Following is a summary of five different fantasy theme analysis.
A Day Without a Mexican is a mockumentary film on what it would be like if all of the
Mexicans in California had disappeared. “Clash in Paradise: A Fantasy Theme Analysis of A
Day Without a Mexican” by John L. Marambio and Chad Tew gives a deep look into this film.
This film focuses on how Latinos are made to feel invisible by the Anglos in California, and if
they were to disappear, the Anglos would realize how much they depend on the Latinos. This
fantasy theme is called “missing in paradise”. To add to the invisibility Latinos feel, this film
wanted to also show their loss of identity. This loss of identity is done through Anglos not
recognizing different Latinos, but instead grouping them all as “Mexicans”, as used in the title of
the film. Anglos may have felt it was difficult to understand this film’s message because it made
them to be pretty useless without the Mexicans, and Latinos may have found it difficult also
because this film still depicts them as just labor that Anglos are used to. The purpose of the film
was to try to even the playing field and have Anglos recognize that the Latinos are an important
asset to society, but it seems to of fallen short in getting this message across.
“The World’s Nicest Grown-Up: A Fantasy Theme Analysis of News Media Coverage of
Fred Rogers” by Ronald Bishop pulls 103 news stories and broadcast news transcripts about Fred
Rogers, of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, and uses fantasy analysis to look into the “shared
worldview” of him (Bishop, 2003, p. 17). The articles collectively referred to Rogers as being an
“itinerant preacher” whom brings television to its potential by helping children learn (Bishop,
2003, p. 18). Rogers being so nice all the time and journalist’ respect for him are both fantasy
themes. Rogers helps children feel comfortable with his nice mannerisms and friendly
neighborhood but he also helps parents feel more comfortable letting their children watch
television.
“Southern Identity in Southern Living Magazine” by Tracy Lauder uses fantasy theme
analysis to analyze the editor’s letters in Southern Living Magazine which show how
“Southerners” are represented. These letters suggest that Southerners currently live in the South,
are very close to their fellow Southerners, they are hospitable, and believe that whites are the
dominant race. The letters also show that the history of the South is very important to
Southerners. All of this information is how the magazine portrayed Southerners, so it may or
may not actually hold true for Southerners, but many people do believe that this is the way
Southerners are because this is the way that they have been portrayed in this medium.
In “A Fantasy Theme Analysis of Political Cartoons on the Clinton-Lewinsky-Starr
Affair” by William Benoit, Andrew Klyukovski, John McHale, and David Airne, 2,000 political
cartoons of Clinton, Lewinsky and Starr are analyzed. Political cartoons have been found to be
very persuasive which is what makes this topic important. Very few of the political cartoons
shined Clinton, Lewinsky or Starr in a positive light which could have helped mold the public
opinion of them into a negative light. It also provided more information about the affair,
impeachment, and character flaws in each person, which gave the public an inside look that they
had not seen before. This type of press could have only added to the fire and brought out more of
the drama in it.
“Rhetorical Visions of Motherhood: A Feminist Analysis of the What to Expect Series”
by Catherine A. Dobris and Kim White-Mills uses fantasy theme analysis to search for themes in
the What to Expect childbirth and childbearing book series. The purpose of this is to see what
contributions these books may have made to how present society views motherhood. The fantasy
analysis of these books found that they are primarily set in a “traditional” setting where the
women want to have children and most likely see it as a high point in their life. Also males are
portrayed as the leaders in these books. These types of themes, although may be empowering to
some, do add to cultural and gender stereotypes.
Each of these summaries shows that the fantasy theme analysis unravels the meanings
behind each item and the effects that it causes.
Q-sort, which is an alternative research method, uses a scale to measure personality traits
in a person. Below are summaries of fives studies in which Q-sort was used in which the
attachment an infant or child has to their mother based on both their mothers and their own
behaviors is looked at. The majority of these involve infants or toddlers, while one looks at older
children.
“Maternal Sensitivity and the Security of Infant-Mother Attachment: A Q-Sort Study” by
David R. Pederson, Greg Moran, Carolyn Sitko, Kathy Campbell, Kristen Ghesquire, and
Heather Acton is a study that took 40 mothers and had two observers observe them and their 12month-old for two hours twice at home. The observers then used the Waters Attachment
Behavior Q-sort to describe the infant and the Maternal Behavior Q-sort to describe the mother.
More secure infants tended to have mothers that seemed to enjoy their baby more and noticed
their baby’s signals more. Also, the more maternal sensitivity a mother had, the more the infant
was attached to her. These findings further the claims of the importance of interaction at home
with infants and the relationship between infant attachment and maternal sensitivity.
In “Emotion Regulation Among School-Age Children: The Development and Validation
of a New Criterion Q-Sort Scale” by Ann Shields and Dante Cicchetti a new Q-sort scale, the
Emotion Regulation Q-Scale, was created to be geared towards older children. It was then tested
using a multitrait-multimethod matrix to test its assessment of emotions, which it did. T-tests
were then used to test if the Q-test could distinguish between well-regulated and disregulated
groups, which it also did. The strengths of this scale is that it minimizes response bias, can be
used for a large age range, and the new Q-sort scale also look into emotional development based
on personality characteristics.
“Reliability and Validity of a Q-Sort Measure of Attachment Security in Hispanic
Infants” by Nancy A. Busch-Rossnagel, Maria P. Fracasso, and Maribel Vargas took the Q-sort
scale and translated it into Spanish to see if it would also work on a Hispanic population of 43
mothers and 43 infants. The study was done using the Ainsworth Strange Situation, meaning “a
standardized laboratory procedure that lasts about 20 minutes and consists of eight episodes
presented in a set order, subjects infants to gradually increasing stress by the stress setting, the
entrance of an unfamiliar adult female, and two brief separations from the parent” (BuschRossnagel, 1994, p. 244). Sixteen of the babies were insecure-avoidant, 17 were secure, and 10
were insecure-resistant. This test resulted in moderate levels of reliability and validity for the Qsort.
“Parenting and Attachment Among Toddlers with Congenital Anomalies: Examing the
Strange Situation and Attachment Q-Sort” by Melissa Clements and Douglas Barnett took 72
toddlers with neurological and non-neurological birth defects to assess their attachment to their
parents using the Strange Situation. The more the child’s appearance was disfigured, the higher
quality of parenting there was, and the more the child was attached to the parent. Positive
parenting quality resulted in the child having more attachment security to their parent.
“Q-Sort Assessment of Attachment Security During the Preschool Years: Links From
Home to School” by Elizabeth K. DeMulder, Susanne Denham, Michelle Schmidt, and Jennifer
Mitchell used 94 preschool-aged children and their mothers for this study. Over a two to three
week period the child and mother were observed at home or the child was observed at daycare
along with their relationship with their teacher. Mothers also completed a Life Experience
Survey that looked into stressful life events and teacher completed the Social Competence and
Behavior Evaluation on the child. Children in families with high stress felt less security and for
boys security with their teacher was related to the security they felt with their teacher. Also for
boys, the higher stress at home, the more they acted out in anger or aggression in school.
These studies show that Q-sort can be used on all types of children to access their
behavior correlated with their attachment to their mother or parents.
Fantasy Theme Analysis and Q-sort could be triangulated to delve deeper into a child’s
attachment to their mother. The fantasy theme analysis on Fred Rogers from Mister Rogers’
Neighborhood could be used but then further looked into. At the end of the summary for “The
World’s Nicest Grown-Up: A Fantasy Theme Analysis of News Media Coverage of Fred
Rogers” I state that “Rogers helps children feel comfortable with his nice mannerism and
friendly neighborhood but he also helps parents feel more comfortable letting their children
watch television.” Children that watch this show could then have their parents fill out a Q-sort
test based on how the child behaves towards Rogers and how the child says that they feel about
Rogers. It could then be looked at if this child has an attachment to Rogers. The Q-sort test could
also be done on the child’s relationship to the parent. This would allow a comparison to be done
between the child’s attachment to Rogers and their attachment to their mother.
Also, because the Fantasy Theme Analysis of Rogers focuses on his personality, him
being seemingly nice and friendly while teaching the children, this information could also be
used to look at the child’s attachment to him. This information would count towards his
“behaviors” just as in previous studies the behavior of the parent is looked at. Then the behaviors
of Rogers and the child’ parents can be compared to see if this corresponds to the child’s
attachment to them both.
This information could further research by showing how much television can affect
children and how integrated into their lives the “characters” on the television can become. If it is
found that many children are more attached to Rogers than to their own mothers, or even feel the
same attachment to them both, this would be very telling of how big of an impact the television
has on children. It may also show how we need to be acting towards children, maybe they are
just responding to him better because he is always nice and friendly, and their mother may not be
that way. Also, if television does have this big of an impact on children, further regulations may
need to be set forth for children’s safety.
References
Benoit, W., Klyukovski, A., McHale, J., & Airne, D. (2010). A fantasy theme analysis of
political cartoons on the Clinton-Lewinsky-Starr affair. Critical Studies in Media
Communication, 18(4), 377-394.
Bishop, R. (2003). The World's Nicest Grown-Up: A Fantasy Theme Analysis Of News Media
Coverage Of Fred Rogers. Journal of Communication, 53(1), 16-31.
Busch-Rossnagel, N. A., Fracasso, M. P., & Vargas, M. (1994). Reliability And Validity Of A
Q-Sort Measure Of Attachment Security In Hispanic Infants. Hispanic Journal of
Behavioral Sciences, 16(3), 240-254.
Clements, M., & Barnett, D. (2002). Parenting And Attachment Among Toddlers With
Congenital Anomalies: Examining The Strange Situation And Attachment Q-sort. Infant
Mental Health Journal , 23(6), 625-642.
DeMulder, E. K., Denham, S., Schmidt, M., & Mitchell, J. (2000). Q-sort Assessment Of
Attachment Security During The Preschool Years: Links From Home To School..
Developmental Psychology, 36(2), 274-282.
Dobris, C., & White-Mills, K. (2006). Rhetorical Visions of Motherhood: A Feminist Analysis
of the What to Expect Series. Women and Language, 29(1), 26-36.
Lauder, T. (2011). Southern Identity in Southern Living Magazine. Journal of Geography ,
111(1), 27-38.
Marambio, J. L., & Tew, C. (2006). Clash In Paradise: A Fantasy Theme Analysis Of A Day
Without A Mexican. The Journal of American Culture, 29(4), 475-492.
Pederson, D. R., Moran, G., Sitko, C., Campbell, K., Ghesquire, K., & Acton, H. (1990).
Maternal Sensitivity And The Security Of Infant-Mother Attachment: A Q-Sort Study.
Child Development, 61(6), 1974.
Shields, A., & Cicchetti, D. (1997). Emotion Regulation Among School-age Children: The
Development And Validation Of A New Criterion Q-sort Scale.. Developmental
Psychology, 33(6), 906-916.