Does Media and Societal Changes Reflect the Group Behaviour of Young Adults - Essay Example

Does Media And Societal Changes Reflect the Group Behaviour of Young Adults Introduction Young adults of the 1960s were collectively known as the TV generation, becoming the video generation in the 1970s, and then as the Nintendo generation in the 1980s. Even then, the adult world already frowned on the harmful effects that too much preoccupation with the video screen could do to the youth. Now that young adults live in the radically different Internet age, in which more forms of media and communication vie for their attention, this compounds the reasons for adults to feel concerned about the possible distraction the new media could bring to stunt the proper development of their children. A big part of this fear relates to the sex-and-violence content of media, which is widely construed as capable of eroding the moral and social fiber of a nation that does not subscribe to media censorship. This is especially the case in UK, which steadfastly pursues the media policy of self-regulation (PCC Citing online source). Amongst the more popular complaints raised by older people against the Internet generation of today are their waning interest in books and their marked impatience to grow up. Is this attitude a result of the adverse influence of media, which comes in so many forms in so many homes that they are beginning to circumscribe the activities of the youth The other questions that are being asked apropos this issue are: Does more media owned by homes contribute to the changing boundary between public and private spaces Does the highly diversified media forms and contents affect individualised or globalised lifestyles Do new screen technologies contribute to a convergence in information, education and entertainment What are the consequences to social relationships of the shift from a one-way to a more interactive communication system This discursive essay argues that media and the dizzying changes brought about by technology in the social environment exert a big influence on how young adults in UK behave as a group. Even before the advent of new media, the British are amongst the largest audience of traditional media, which used to consist mainly of newspapers, radio and TV. In an old survey of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, it was shown that the British bought more newspapers per head of the population than any other people in the world. It follows that UK is amongst the biggest users of new media, too. New Media and Social Environment The phenomenon known as "new media" consists of such screen-based media as TV, videos, computer games, personal computers, the Internet, etc. Most UK homes are now the sites of integrated telecommunications, broadcasting, computer and video access, thus giving the TV screen at home a multi-media culture. As a result, use of media occupies so much of the time of young people. Optimists see in this situation a window of opportunity to enhance democratic and community participation. The pessimists, however, lament it as a factor that robs children of their innocence and respect for authority (Livingstone, S. 2000 p. 98). The new media forms and the convergence of information services in the homes signal a trend towards individual lifestyles and democratisation. With people able to choose and control media contents, it open up possibilities for reframing the relationships between public and private spaces, constructing individualised lifestyle and challenging traditional knowledge hierarchies through democratic participation. Coupled with the inroads of new media forms is the growing unpredictability in society brought about by the onrush of new technology, rising population and the widening gap between the rich and the poor. Amongst the symptoms of this phenomenon is the rise of a youth subculture that cries for individualism and sees young adults wearing outlandish costumes, thrift-store gowns and kooky hats. By their clothing, they announce that their behaviour is likely to be unpredictable (Toffler, A. 1971 p. 371). Such adoption of a lifestyle and affiliation with a certain subculture can be seen as an effort to lower the level of novelty or unpredictability in the microenvironment. In effect, media and society bring cultural conditioning that gives young people the ability to cope with future changes and adapt well to them (Klineberg, S. 1967 p. 192). One of the beneficial effects of the changing face of media and society, this ability to anticipate the future becomes a habit with young adults. As students, they are the type who scans the table of contents before starting to read, and if they become executives later on, they also think in long-range terms. Children and young people are usually the first and most frequent users of new media in the family. In time, the media forms available in the house serve as tools with which the young adults construct their identities, negotiate social relations and generate peer culture (Ziehe, 1994) as cited in Livingstone, S. (2000 p. 102). In effect, media use shapes young people's sense of values, identity and ambitions. It also serves as marker of their transformation to maturity. As to whether this media influence is all for the good remains a subject for debate. Theoretical Perspectives One of the least contested theories on media influence is the view that the media screen has displaced reading in the life of young adults. This was supported by a major nationwide survey of British youth aged 6 to 17, which included interviews with other young people at home and school. The study found that in the eyes of the youth, books have become "old-fashioned, boring, frustrating, and on the way out." Reading is thus associated with being lonely, staying indoors and being separate from friends. However, a sprinkling of the youth interviewees, especially girls, confessed that they still read certain types of book such as horror and bedtime stories. A few percentage of the boys also read detective stories from time to time. Another theory that meets with few arguments is the postulate that the young people of today place a higher value on adult culture, such that they are too impatient to get to the next stage of their lives. A result of watching too much adult-oriented TV programmes and films, this is happening among young adults right in everyone's neighbourhood. They are experimenting with sex early, driving a car early, marrying early. In short, most young people now exhibit a desire to be years older than their present age so they can access the opportunities and facilities denied to them by adults (Peterson, J. et al. 1991 p. 101). There are three different perspectives on the extent of media influence on the way people behave and act in their everyday lives. One is called the "hypodermic needle" model, which holds that the audience accepts any media message without question. This means that if one sees a killing or rape on TV, he then proceeds to kill or rape somebody, a line of reasoning that many find bereft of common sense. It is argued that there are just too many variables to alter a person's perception of media messages. The other media influence model invokes "inoculation," which contends that the audience becomes immune and desensitised to any media message after an overdose due to repetition. So overexposure to sex and violence, which are the recurring themes in media, eventually fails to elicit any response from them. Most scholars dispute this theory, too, for being as improbable as the hypodermic needle effect. The third theory finds wider acceptance because of the more down-to-earth reasons it ascribes to media consumption. Called "uses and gratifications" model, this concept maintains that people use media for other reasons no farther than gratifying their need for escapism, education and information. Any influence a media message leaves in them is limited to identifying roles and values, interacting with other people and introducing some sense of security in their lives. For this reason, a growing number of sociologists warn against blanket assertions that media content determines sexual attitudes, values and behaviour (Werner-Wilson, R., et al. 2004 p. 48). Some young adults may in fact succumb to media influences, but many others do not. The deciding factor is individual personality - the adolescents' identity formation, development of moral reasoning and problem solving, their abilities, interests, social relationships, and needs (Malamuth & Impett 2001 p. 290). If personality development in adolescence is flawed, media exerts greater influence, the uses-and-gratifications theorists argue. Positive and Negative Effects Children behave pretty much the same as their elders did. The average British youth grow up, watch TV, argue with parents, study hard or become disaffected with school. Unlike their parents, however, the young people of today are increasingly becoming global citizens, in touch with other people and other places in the world. This is one of the positive influences of the new media, which seems to hold true only on the short-term basis. The downside is, with their more open eyes and broader perspective, the new media generation become more prone to divorce when they get married, more of the women will be working for wages, and they go home to a radically changed family structure (Roberts, D. 1993 p. 641). Is the lack of outside activities for young adults and their expertise with computers affecting family authority Another positive effect of the new media is the way educational TV programmes and even certain video games train young adults about future eventualities. They develop the useful habit of anticipation, which will serve them in good stead when they grow into adults. For example, they know what to do in case of a devastating earthquake, or to administer first-aid when someone drowns. Science fiction, another recurring theme in films and TV programmes, which is sometimes referred to as the literature of the future, is also viewed as a kind of sociology of the future. Reading Arthur C. Clarke, Robert Heinlein, Ray Bradbury and Robert Sheckley tell young adults not only about rocket ships and time machines, but more important, they also lead young minds through an imaginative exploration of the jungle of the political, social, psychological and ethical issues that will confront them as adults (Toffler, A. 1971 p. 413). Amongst the negative influences of media relates to trial by publicity, in which crime suspects are already considered guilty even before a court judgment. There is also the persistent belief that unqualified people often get elected to high office because of media. This is said to be the case with the late John F. Kennedy who won over Richard Nixon in the 1960 US presidential race largely because the former looked good on TV as compared to the latter. The media popularity of Reagan and Arnold Scwharzenegger may have also catapulted them to political prominence. One of the famous cases of violence believed influenced by media is the killing of John Lennon in 1980, the assailant Mark Chapman having confessed later that Lennon's music and J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye moved him before the attack. Another case involves the UK exhibitions of Stanley Kubrick's film A Clockwork Orange, after which authorities noticed a surge of copycat rape-murder cases with chilling resemblance to the modus operandi played out in the movie. For this reason, Kubrick hastily withdrew his film from further syndication in UK. The popular film Rambo may have also triggered another incident of mayhem in 1987. A man dressed like Rambo shot 16 people dead and wounded 15 others in the village of Hungerford, after which the suspect killed himself too. Moral Panics Young minds are admittedly impressionable and especially susceptible to negative media influence. Thus, media gets the blame for suggestive content every time youth delinquency becomes a pronounced social problem, which has bothered UK authorities in the past few years. Because of a perceived surge in anti-social behaviour amongst British youth, the government enacted a series of measures starting with the 1969 Children and Young Persons Act. This was followed by the Crime and Disorder Act in 1998, which established the Youth Justice Board for Policy; the 1999 Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act, which introduced the referral system for youth offenders; and the 2003 Anti-Social Behaviour Act, which addressed youth activities that cause public nuisance. However, there is a sneaking suspicion that media exaggerated these threats from youth offenders through what sociologists call "moral panic (Garland, D. 1996 p. 375)." The term gained popular usage in UK after the infamous clash between the Mods and Rockers bikers at Clacton beach resort in 1964. In retrospect, all the damage done was a few vandalized beach huts and broken windows. Nonetheless, media accounts the following day made out the event as a "Day of Terror (Daily Telegraph)," an "invasion of Wild Ones (Daily Mirror)." The reports used such uncalled-for descriptions as "riot, siege, orgy, screaming mob," in effect blowing up and sensationalizing the event for no other worthwhile reason than to boost readership (Burns, H. 2002 Citing online source). Another case of a more recent vintage involves singer Brian Harvey of the East 17 Band, who admitted in a TV interview that he had used the drug Ecstasy. Harvey was promptly branded a heretic by media and his band's songs banned from 13 British radio stations. It turned out that Harvey tried Ecstasy only once out of curiosity. More such moral panics and more folk devils are expected to be created by media not because of its inner logic but because "our society as presently structured will continue to generate problems for its members (Burns, H. 2002 Citing online source)." Jeffrey, V. (1998 p. 28) describes moral panic as "a form of collective behaviour in which a condition, episode, person or group of persons emerges to become a threat to societal values and interest." Conclusion and Arguments The preceding theories and perspectives leave no room for doubt that media and society are key determinants in the collective social behaviour of young adults. What remains to be resolved is whether the influence is good or bad, and which of media and society exerts a stronger influence on the behaviour and mind-set of young adults. However, the evidence seems to favour the view that cases of media-inspired deviancy among the youth are rare and isolated, and that the misbehaving youth groups only appear as social deviants because of media in the first place. Under the moral panic theory cited in this essay, media organisations undeservedly demonize a group of persons solely for the purpose of increasing their sales or patronage. Just because young adults go around wearing outlandish clothes does not mean that they pose a threat to society. In most cases, these young people are harmless and are only using clothes to express their newfound sense of identity and individuality. This attitude is seen as a consequence of societal changes brought about by new technology, increasing population and the widening gap between the rich and the poor. Again, such influence is not all bad since it fosters the spirit of democracy and equality. Combined with the educational benefits derived from the conglomeration of new media, the adolescents' greater sense of individuality gives them a broader outlook and anticipatory skills to cope with the challenges of the future. Adults look at the new media as an evil influence for luring young adults away from reading, but research persistently shows that reading still command a following among adolescents, particularly with respect to bedtime stories and horror genre. The Livingstone, S. (2002 p. 99) study points out that young adults shy away from reading as a natural result of their restlessness and the urge to be active and on the move, not because of a deep-seated hatred for reading per se. The logical expectation is that because of their broader perspective and heightened sense of individuality, they would take to reading at some point in their lives once they notice that everybody is more on media than books. 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Adolescents and Parent Perceptions of Media Influence on Adolescent Sexuality. Adolescence, Summer 2004. Read More