The mass media works in many different ways to promote different values within our society today. The media seems to have more of a negative influence upon society but can we find a way to improve it for more positive outlooks? Is it a matter of better educating people in society to block out the bad influences or misconceptions coming through the media and educating the to only listen to ‘truthful’ journalistic views. We are in a world today where media is almost impossible to escape. 

MEDIA EDUACTION

There are many different institutes that involve education which include School, Tafe, University and Family. There is also a certain ‘life long education’ and it is clearly evident that media falls into this category as media seems to become a life long entertainment source in most of our lives. The media itself becomes a raconteur throughout our lives and media is all around us and it becomes very hard to ignore. Children and young adults are learning about all these different things through the mass media, such as movies, Television Shows, Magazines and music and all this media is being controlled by multi national corporations.

These corporations have the power to choose what issues or story’s they want to cover and how they want to cover them and this is where we can become highly influenced through media portrayals. These portrayals aren’t always true and can become misleading or miscommunicated. Rice (2007) states that ‘Journalistic non-partisanship and accuracy…have the paradoxical consequence of reinforcing and legitimating the status-quo.’ Rice (2007) also mentions the role of the gatekeepers (editors) and how they generally shape the media by influencing the public to pay more attention to ‘what the gatekeepers feel are the more important issues of the day.’ So this suggests that not everything we see on the media is totally accurate information as it can be molded to become a more entertaining solution for the public rather than the truth.

GOOD INFLUENCE

The influences that media has on us, especially with the younger generation is seen as either bad or good. The media can be a good influence when addressing issues such as Drugs, Obesity, Global warming and sexual violence etc. TV shows like ‘the biggest loser, which deals with overweight people getting healthy and fit can be of good value to overweight people as it is a positive outlook for losing weight and showing off good health and wellbeing. Other aspects of the media that are seen as a good influence are government run ad campaigns telling us things like not to smoke, be sun smart, and alerting us on such things like sexual violence. Things like the anti-smoking campaign where they use images & footage of the shocking things caused by smoking play on peoples health values to find it within themselves to quit smoking for their own well being. Other Government controlled media that are seen as a positive are types of media that promotes social stability. This is evident within such careers as police, hospitals, schools and farms and is seen at a form of functionalism as it functions the various elements of a social system. Issues like the environment and global warming also can be well educated through the media such as Al Gore’s Documentary film “An Inconvenient Truth” and also increasing environmental coverage in general through the mass media. The effect of high coverage on a certain issue gains awareness and better educates society about that issue making them want to extend their knowledge and self-interest within that issue. 

MASS MEDIA AND THE GROWTH IN KNOWLEDGE

by P. J. Tichenor, G. A. Donohue, and C. N. Olien 

“The Knowledge Gap Hypothesis might be expressed, operationally, in at least two different ways.

1. Over time, acquisition of knowledge of a heavily publicised topic will proceed at a faster rate among better educated persons than among those with less education; and
2. At a given point in time, there should be a higher correlation between acquisition of knowledge and education for topics highly publicised in the media than for topics less highly publicised.

One would expect the knowledge gap to be especially prominent when one or more of the contributory factors are operative. Thus, to the extent that communication skills, prior knowledge, social contact, or attitudinal selectivity is engaged, the gap should widen as heavy mass media flow continues.”

 I read this article and thought it was a very interesting piece as it ties in with my groups topic area of Education. I have extracted a small piece of it which highlights its main area of discussion. 

As a group we see a link between education and media where the mass media can become a highly influential source for learning and gaining knowledge of certain issues of today. A certain hypothesis came about in a case study from Tichenor, Donohue and Olien, which suggests that ‘increasing the flow of news on a topic leads to greater acquisition of knowledge about that topic among the more highly educated segments of society’ (Tichenor, Donohue and Olien,1970). In this paper we found out about the “gap hypothesis”, Which states that ‘as the infusion of mass media information into a social system increases, segments of the population with higher socioeconomic status tends to acquire this information at a faster rate than the lower status segments, so that the gap in knowledge between these segments tend to increase rather than decrease. The hypothesis makes good points on the connection between gaining knowledge and education for issues or topics highly publicised in the mass media that for those less highly publicised. This so called ‘gap hypothesis’ also suggests that the media is failing through mass publicity to inform the public at large. Another interesting concept that comes about in this paper is that ‘as people learn more their interests increases, and as their interests increases, they are impelled to learn more.’ So this supports that increasing media coverage on a certain topic and educating through the media will gain a higher interest and acquisition of knowledge through the mass media.