Media Effects

Do you know how much the media influences you?  The documentary The Mean World Syndrome explains George Gerbner’s cultivation theory and the effect the media has on our lives.  Cultivation theory studies the impact that television has on the way we see the world.  Gerbner says that the amount of time we watch television is proportional to how fearful we are of the world around us.  This mean world syndrome says that heavy viewers of TV will have more anxiety, fear, and anger and think the world is a more dangerous and scary place than it actually is.  Television is has increasing become more full of violent content and it makes us more aware of what could happen to us.  If you just finished a Criminal Minds marathon, you will probably be looking over your shoulder a few more times than normal later.  The news especially has a great influence on how we view the world.  The top story is always a violent crime or fire and we connect more personally with it because it is close by.  A person who solely watches the local news all day will probably have some fear when they are outside.

As a little kid I remember being scared that something on TV would happen in real life, but I did not watch so much television that it was a constant fear.  When I’m not at school I definitely watch more TV because I have access to it.  At school because I don’t have cable, I rarely watch the news or anything that’s not on Netflix.  At school I depend more on other types of media for news.  I definitely think what we see on TV affects how we see the world.  I am not greatly impacted by TV, but I still see the mean world syndrome being valid.  Watching the news and seeing violent shows on television makes me aware that there are bad things out there and that I should be cautious, but it doesn’t paralyze me with fear to the point where I don’t want to leave as it does with some heavy users.

Symbolic Ambiguity

In Quentin Schultze’s book Communicating for Life, he discusses the topic of symbolic ambiguity.  He talks about the ambiguity of symbols; the meanings of symbols and how these meanings are not fixed.  Different people have different meanings for different ideas or objects.  We all interpret situations, words, and ideas according to our own views.  I can have a positive association with something, and you may have a negative association with the same exact thing.  We even interpret the same words differently.  It can also work in the opposite direction.  People can have the same idea, but if they are not communicating it with words that everyone agrees on the meanings of, then not everyone will be on the same page.  But, symbolic ambiguity does allow for us to have things like jokes and puns that play on the same word having multiple meanings.

So can we get rid of symbolic ambiguity so everyone can communicate without misunderstanding?  It is pretty much impossible to completely get rid of it, but groups of people can agree on the meanings of symbols to help increase common understanding.  This just shows that communication is by no means a fixed set of rules.  There is always different interpretations of meanings for the same thing.  This differences can be because of cultural differences, age differences, or just our individual view of the world.  When we communicate, we have to make sure we make ourselves clear to others.  Even though it is impossible to have everybody understand you 100% of the time, it is helpful to be aware that someone may interpret what you say in a different way than you intended.

Media Fast

Yesterday I participated in a media fast.  I tried to avoid all media.  Before I started, I knew it would be hard but didn’t realize how hard it would actually be.  I had no idea how much media is ingrained in our lives and how dependent I am upon it.  It made me realize that media is such an important part of our lives, from the time we wake up to the time we go to bed.  When I woke up in the morning, my first reaction it to check my phone and look at Instagram, check texts and snapchats, but I couldn’t do any of that.  I couldn’t even check my email, which kind of stressed me out because I was afraid of missing something.  I found myself at some points not even knowing what to do.  I had some free time and since I couldn’t watch Netflix or go online, I had to go find other things to do that did not involve media which was very difficult.  Even just talking to a friend is a challenge because they always want to show you something on their phone.

It just makes me realize how dependent I am on technology and media.  Somethings are just so imbedded in our lives that we don’t even realize that they are media.  I was in the car and the radio just comes on and about two minutes down the road I realize that I using media, so I have to drive the rest of the time in silence.  Even in the cafeterias you are surrounded by media.  They have the menus on TVs and the menus are also online.  At the end of the day I felt very isolated and wanted to know what was going on in the outside world.  I couldn’t remove myself from every single form of media, because in this day in age it is nearly impossible.  But trying to consciously stay away from television, the Internet, texting, calling, email, newspapers, and radio was difficult.  This media fast really brought to my attention the massive amounts of media we consume on a daily basis and how sometimes I may need to take a break from it.