We’re All Experts on the
Media…but Psychological
Research Tells Us Much of
What We “Know” Is Wrong
Richard Jackson Harris
Kansas State University
Manhattan KS
Psychological and Educational Research in
Kansas/Nebraska Psychological Society
Fort Hays State University
Hays KS
November 15, 2014
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Why Care about Media?
Media are everywhere
Bhutan got TV and Internet 2000—last country?
Technology has radically affected lifestyles
Young adults never known life without Internet, e-mail
Cell phones change association of phone with person
rather than place
Cell phones revolutionize developing countries
More multi-tasking by young adults and teens
Americans spend more time watching TV and
online than anything else except job and sleeping
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Social Media Use Unprecedented
Over 100 hours of video uploaded to
YouTube every minute!
More new video uploaded to YouTube each day
than all US TV networks broadcast last 5 years
80% North Americans use Internet daily
1.23 billion Facebook users (1/6 of
humanity)
Average 55 minutes per day
Over 1 billion Google searches/day
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What Does Research Tell Us?
Considerable research about media effects
Particularly effects of violence
Public ignorance about findings from research
Misunderstandings about these effects
“Media-bashers”—”it’s all the media’s fault”
“Media-apologists”—”it’s only make-believe”
Actual situation more complex
Sometimes effects strong… but not always
Effects of some images stronger than others
Effects on some people stronger than others
Statistical interactions more than main effects
Media are not the only influence on us
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Types of Media Effects
Behavioral (modeling)
We see…we do
Attitudinal
We see...we believe
Cognitive (knowledge)
We see…we learn
Physiological (arousal)
We see…our body responds
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What I’ll Talk About Today…..
Look at some popular beliefs about media
that are widely believed but not correct
Everything I say based on research
But I won’t be talking directly about research
I am a cognitive psychologist so especially
interested in knowledge acquired from media
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Belief #1: Internet degrading
quality of communication
Fact: Internet changing communication but
not in the ways we think (Gernsbacher, 2014)
Using Internet more to communicate shows
strong preference for
Written over oral communication
Asynchronous over synchronous
communication
Creating and sharing media as well as
consuming it
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Belief #2: Subliminal messages are
messing with our minds
Subliminal=below threshold of perception
By definition, you’re not aware of them
Everyone’s threshold different
Types of subliminal perception
1. Rapid visual stimuli
2. Subaudible auditory stimuli
3. Visually embedded figures airbrushed into artwork
4. Secret messages if song played backwards
Need to separate existence and effects
Existence necessary but not sufficient to produce effect
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Effects of “subliminal” stimuli
Don’t even notice unless pointed out
But existence does not mean it has effect
No effects on behavior
Example: Comprehension of backward
speech (Vokey & Read, 1985)
Backmasking Ex
www.jeffmilner.com/backmasking
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Belief #3: Media violence only reflects the
real world, which is a very violent place
60% US TV programs contain violence
5-6 violent acts/hour no prime-time TV
26/hr on cartoons (94% have violence)
Die Hard 2 had 264 on-screen murders
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But, compared to real life…..
Real life (FBI stats)
87% crimes nonviolent
13% crimes violent
0.2% crimes murders
Television
87% crimes violent
13% nonviolent
50% crimes murders
• 250% higher than life
Fact: Media are far
more violent than the
real world
90
80
70
60
50
Nonviol.
Violent
40
30
20
10
0
Real
TV
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Belief # 4: All screen violence is
equally harmful
No—some types have stronger negative effects
More realistic violence
Violence by “good guys”
• Or people like us, those we identify with
• Particular concern about violence by children
Violence that is reinforced (or not punished) in story
• Violence justified as necessary to fight greater evil (Myth of
Redemptive Violence)
• 75% instances of media violence show no immediate
punishment or condemnation of violence
Violence that does not show suffering
• 50% show no harm or pain to victim
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Belief # 4: All screen violence is
equally harmful (continued)
No—some people are more affected
Males more violent than females
Younger more violent than older
Those more prone to violence by personality
Those who are more physiologically aroused
• Especially those who are angry
Those lacking positive role models
….. Beware especially of violent, angry, alienated
young men (those high in multiple risk factors)
But we’ve all become somewhat desensitized
Screen violence doesn’t bother us so much anymore
We tend to think real world is like entertainment world
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Belief #5: Children today see everything
and nothing scares them any more
Fact: Children’s fears differ at different ages
Preschoolers—most afraid of changing forms,
monsters, mutants
• clowns, Santa Claus
Elementary age—most afraid of concrete injuries,
disasters
• The Lion King and Bambi two of scariest movies for kids (G)
Preteens and teens—most afraid of hypothetical
dangers and negative outcomes
Parents must be sensitive to child’s age and fears
Almost everyone has childhood memory of seeing
movie that scared them (Hoekstra, Harris, & Helmick, 1999)
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Belief #6: Violent crime is getting
much worse in recent years
Fact: Violent crime has fallen precipitously
throughout the U.S. in last 25 years
But most people believe it has risen
Number of TV news stories about murders
increased over 500% in 1990s
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Belief #6: Violent crime getting
much worse (continued)
Fact: We remember vivid examples of crimes as
far more typical than they are
Missing children mostly runaways
• Those few abducted almost always taken by non-custodial
parent or other family member
• Very few stranger abductions (1.3% of all)—few end in murder
Carjacking–> murder < 1% of time
• After seeing carjackingmurder story, people estimate 3040% carjackings  murder
School or workplace shootings very rare
• But those that occur are very memorable
Past “trendy” crimes (road rage, poison Halloween
candy): Confirmed cases very few
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Belief # 7: People with mental
illness are dangerous
Facts
11% overall population
prone to violence (All)
11% diagnosed mentally
ill prone to violence (M.I.)
72% mentally ill TV/film
characters prone to
violence (M.I. media)
No wonder people are
scared of those with
mental illnesses!
80
70
60
50
40
Group
30
20
10
0
All
M.I
M.I.
Media
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Belief # 8: Sexual messages are
largely limited to pornography
Thus we can dismiss if we don’t consume
pornography
Not so fast…..
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Fact: There are many sexual
messages in media…for example,
Sitcom father, to teen daughter: “You got a D on your
report card? Oh, wait, it’s okay; it was in sex
education”
Soap opera plot: Man rapes woman; she then falls in
love with him and marries him
Movie plot: 3 high school senior boys vow to lose their
virginity at any cost before they graduate
Sitcom man, on seeing foxily-dressed wife: “Man, if I
wasn’t married to you, I’d be really turned on now.”
TV Commercial Scene 1 (man to woman) “The pizza
will be here in 30 minutes. What shall we do until then?
Scene 2 (woman, to man in robe) “What do we do for
the other 28 minutes?”
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Sexualization of food in ads
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Belief #9: Sexual permissiveness is rampant
in media
Fact: Double standard: extreme permissiveness....
Entertainment—much casual sex
• Assumption of sex early in adult relationships
 Only a moral issue for teens (if then)
• Most of it between people not married to each other
 97% in R-rated movies, 83% in TV overall
• Assumption that being a virgin is odd
• Little talk of abstinence before marriage
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Fact: Double standard: extreme permissiveness....
Entertainment—much casual sex
• Assumption of sex early in adult relationships
 Only a moral issue for teens (if then)
• Most of it between people not married to each other
 97% in R-rated movies, 83% in TV overall
• Assumption that being a virgin is odd
• Little talk of abstinence before marriage
…And extreme conservatism/puritanism
Little advertising for birth control, concern for STDs
< 1% cases talk about use of protection before sex
Thus, media sex largely amoral behavior without
consequences
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Belief #10: At least we don’t have to worry
about sex and violence occurring together
Fact: Sadly, not always the case
Yes, there is violent pornography
• Which is highly arousing to naturally violent men
But there is also much suggestion of violence
toward women in a sexual context
• Horror movies
 Desensitizes men toward violence against women
especially if woman shown as sexually around by violence
• Advertising
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PG-13 and R-rated movies
Goldeneye Example PG-13
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVmHgf3u1PQ
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Belief #11: It’s healthy to watch
violence or sex to achieve catharsis
Catharsis, an idea from Freud’s psychology
People have natural violent and sexual instincts
Instincts need to be expressed
• Directly—acting violently or sexually
• Indirectly—watching violence or sex
Emotional release, purging after expressing
Media can assist in achieving catharsis
Idea very widely believed
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Fact: Catharsis is wrong!
Watching violent TV or movies
Leads to more violent behavior, not less
Desensitizes us to violence
Watching sex
Arouses us sexually, doesn’t calm us down
Makes us more likely to feel unfulfilled and
behave sexually, not less
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Belief #12: The media are full of
negative antisocial values
Fact: Sort of true…but in some ways media are
surprisingly conservative
Family -- strong messages of family solidarity
Even dysfunctional families (The Simpsons, Family
Guy, Arrested Development)
Sometime de facto family is coworkers or friends
(Friends, How I Met Your Mother, The Office, 30 Rock)
Sometimes much raunchiness on the way to very
traditional moral message
American Pie, Superbad, Mean Girls, Knocked Up
Unclear whether final positive moral or sexual
humiliations along the way have more influence
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Belief #13: Media only reflect societal values
Not always…..
Little presence of religion
5% TV characters have identifiable religious affiliation
• Over 90% Americans believe in God; over 40% worship
weekly
Religion considered too controversial
Very non-specific spirituality when present
The Simpsons as interesting exception
• Why more acceptable for animated characters to be religious?
Americans do have spiritual hunger
Calling God by phone after Bruce Almighty
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What surprises international students most in US
Students here are so religious
Students here worry about money, not all rich
Where do they get these ideas?
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Belief #14: Only the old shows
and movies are safe
Or are they?……
1950s sitcom: husband shakes fist in wife’s face,
saying, “One of these days, Alice, POW, right in
the kisser!”
According to modern legal definition of rape,
Rhett Butler probably raped Scarlett O’Hara in
Gone with the Wind (1939)
1940s cartoons with racist images still around
Bugs Bunny handing bombs in ice cream cones to
Asians, saying “Here you go, Slanteyes”
Many characters in old TV, film smoke heavily
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Song lyrics “Young Girl” (1968)
Young Girl
www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJFVPxBpezk
“Young girl, get out of my mind, my love for you is
wait out of line. Better run, girl.
You led me to believe you’re old enough to give me
love and now it hurts to know the truth
And though you know that it’s wrong to be alone with
me, that come-on look is in your eyes
Get out of here, before I have the time to change my
mind, ‘Cause I’m afraid we’ll go too far”
Values change, not always in the more permissive
direction
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Conclusion
Media not inherently good or bad
Not monolithic—many media messages
Some negative effects that should concern us
Also tremendous positive potential
All better off if we understand how media work
Be smart media consumers! (Media literacy)
Talk with children about media (Parental mediation)
Negative effects less when processed with parents
Model reading, watching PBS, alternative TV
Children learn negotiation and cooperation skills
from sharing TV/computer
Parents have more control if devices in public room
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Thank you!
Have further questions?
Ask them now
Or e-mail me at rjharris@ksu.edu
Want more information or copies of these
slides?
E-mail me at rjharris@ksu.edu
Read R.J. Harris and F.W. Sanborn, A Cognitive
Psychology of Mass Communication, (6th ed.)
New York: Taylor & Francis, 2014.
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