Constructing our reality based on entertainment
Telling stories v. imparting information
 Most media studies, especially ‘effects’ research, see
the content we encounter as a bundle of information
 Tend to ignore narrative structure
 Usually treat each message as a unique piece of content
without concern over its relation to other messages, the
culture in general
 Gerbner et al. are concerned not with particular pieces
of information, but with the dominant stories within
the US culture
 They see ‘telling stories’ as a powerful cultural force
 People are socialized through the telling of stories
“Television has transformed the cultural process of
story-telling into a centralized, standardized, marketdriven, advertiser-sponsored system . . . the cultural
process of story-telling is now in the hands of global
commercial interests who have something to sell, and
who in effect operate outside the reach of democratic
decision-making.”
Why is this a problem?
 Television has no conscience
 Driven by market dynamics to provide content that is
most likely to hold audience for advertising and to
‘travel well’

Research shows that this tends not to be most liked, but least
objectionable
 Children are most vulnerable but everyone is to some
extent
 US is almost unique in lack of government control over
media content
Traditional effects v. cultivation




Change v. stability
Short-term v. long-term
Individual messages v. message systems
Aggressive behavior v. fear
Traditional effects theory
Exposure to violent
portrayal
Learning violent
behaviors
Aggression/violence
in actual life
 Misjudging the amount of violence in society is sometimes
called the 'mean world syndrome'. Heavy viewers tend to
believe that the world is a nastier place than do light
viewers.
Cultivation theory
Television
Message
System
Mean
World
Syndrome
Fear
The evidence
 Cultural Indicators
 Content analyses (since 1967) of television programming
“to track the most stable, pervasive, and recurrent
images in media content, in terms of the portrayal of
violence, minorities, gender-roles, occupations, and so
on”



Clearly shows heavy use of violence as a plot device
Violence is ubiquitous—kids’ cartoons, daytime serials, Prime
Time programming; comedy, action-adventure, reality TV
Shows who can perform violence and who is a victim


Middle-aged white males have right to engage in violence
Women are victims
“Happy violence”
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Children's
Victim shows no pain
Unrealistically low levels of harm
Nonchildren's
Victim shows no harm
Depicts long-term suffering
Extensive/graphic violence
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Children's
Lethal
Repeated acts
Nonchildren's
Blood & Gore
Amount of violence across subgenres of
children’s programming
Slapstick
Superhero
Adventure/
mystery
Social
relationship
Magazine
% of programs
with violence
100
97
89
48
17
Number of
violent PATs
per hour
29.1
28.1
14.3
4.2
1.6
Number of
violent scenes
per hour
14.9
11.9
7.9
3.0
.9
% of time
devoted to
violence
28.7
24.4
12.9
3.1
1.2
Source: Wilson, Smith, Potter, Kunkel, Linz, Colvin & Donnerstein, 2002
Journal of Communication
Humor/fantasy
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Children's
Humor
Fantasy context
Nonchildren's
Animated format
What is the impact?
 Use surveys to ask how much TV a person watches,
how dangerous she thinks the world is (e.g., how
likely she is to be attacked if she walks alone at
night), whether you can trust people, and so on
 If heavy TV viewers give the ‘TV answer’ then
Gerbner et al. conclude that cultivation has
occurred
 TV answer is determined by projection from Cultural
Indicators findings
Cultivation differential
100
90
80
70
60
Light TV viewers
Heavy TV viewers
50
40
30
20
10
0
Percent saying 10% or more in law enforcement
Cultivation theory
Mean World
Syndrome
Fear,
prejudice,
distrust
Authoritarian
views and
behavior
Additional cultivation concerns
 The same ‘drip drip drip’ that is supposed to make us
fearful also may make us devious, obsessed with
material accumulation, bigoted, sexist, and so on
 Because it happens over time, slowly, and widely
throughout the culture, it is hard to see it happening
Mainstreaming
 Dominant cultural ‘current’ “representing the
broadest and most common dimensions of shared
meanings”
 “Because of its unique role in our society, we see
television as the primary manifestation of our culture’s
mainstream.”
 “Mainstreaming means that heavy viewing may
absorb or override differences in perspectives and
behavior which ordinarily stem from other factors
and influences.”
 Cultural, social and political characteristics of groups
would otherwise lead to more ideological diversity
Mainstreaming
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Low income
Medium
income
High income
Light TV viewers
White
Heavy TV viewers
Black
Resonance
 Where those who live in high-crime neighborhoods
get a ‘double dose of messages that resonate and
amplify cultivation’
 Minorities “whose fictional counterparts are more
frequently victimized on television”
Resonance
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Male
Female
Light TV viewers
Suburb
Heavy TV viewers
City
Cultivation research is very controversial
 Much more questioning of the premise and of the
study methods within the scientific community than
with social learning theory
 Most famous argument between researchers over a
theory that can be found in media studies

Gerbner v. Hirsch
Problems with cultivation research
 No clear psychological process specified that would
produce the results of interest
 ‘Drip drip drip’ is not a theory
 No clear connection between individual fear and the
development of an authoritarian society
 Levels of analysis problem
 Methodological problems
 Definition of what constitutes violence
 Accusations of ‘cherry picking’ high and low TV levels, which
indicators of ‘cultivation’ counted, etc.
 Lack of control for third variables

Heavy TV watchers tend to live in dangerous neighborhood
Problems with cultivation research
 Low correlations
 Limits on survey analyses—many are secondary data
analyses
Strengths of cultivation theory
 It covers a broad range of social phenomena
 Violence
 Prejudice
 Consumerism
 It looks at a wide range of content the individual is
exposed to rather than a small portion
 It does cover multiple levels of analysis
 (but note the problems here)
Factors affecting cultivation
 “Cultivation is dependent on and a manifestation of
the extent to which television’s imagery dominates
viewers’ sources of information.”