ICS Summary chapter 9
Cultivation theory
Television is a dominant force of shaping modern society
Storyteller
Violence on tv can affect viewers beliefs about the world around them
Ads on tv can affects viewers perception about health risks of smoking
Popularity of political positions
3 prongs of Gerbner
Each of the prong tells us something different about the world of TV
First prong – Institutional process analysis
Reasons why media produce the messages they produce
- Use: Lurk behind the scenes of media organizations to discover the
policies or practices
Ex. Violence: cheap to produce and universally understood
Second prong – Message system analysis
What messages does the TV transmit?
- Use: quantitative content analysis
Index of violence
Dramatic violence = the overt expression of physical force as part of the plot
”
Rules out: verbal abuse and idle threats
Index stable and alarmingly high
Equal violence, unequal risk
-More than half of prime-time programs contains violence
-Heroes are just as involved with violence as villians
-Inequality Elderly people and children are harmed at a greater rate than
middle age/young people
African Americans and Hispanics are killed or
beate up more than Caucasian
people on TV
- Stats: 50% of the characters are white middle class males, 3 to 1 is male,
10% are children
People on the margins of American society are put in symbolic double jeopardy
Third prong – Cultivation analysis
Carries most electrical current in the theory aka most action
Difference: Message system analysis = dealing with content of TV
Cultivation analysis = dealing with how TV’s content
affects viewers
, Cultivation as gravity field
Cultivation is like the pull of a gravity field the magnitude of TV’s
influence is not the same for every viewer but all are affected by it.
Accessibility principle = When people make judgements about the world they rely on
the smallest bits of information that come to mind most quickly
Ex. For those who consume lots of TV the most accessible information for
making judgements will come from TV shows
Mainstreaming
= The blurring, blending and bending process by which heavy Tv viewers from disparate
groups develop a common outlook through constant exposure to the same images and
labels.
- TV homogenizes the audience
- Pulls those who might have different from each other into a common
perception of reality
Resonance
= Condition that exists when viewers’ real-life environment is like the world of TV;
these viewers are especially susceptible (=sensitive) to TV cultivating power
People whose real-world environment is very much alike with the Tv world Most
Affected
Why? double dose of the same message because it also happens in their lives and on
TV
Effect people are hesitant to for example get out of the house
Research on cultivation analysis
Cultivation takes time, happens gradually
Strategy for performing cultivation analysis survey
Why not experiments? Change due to cultivation can take place over months and years
and experments take place over 30 or 60 minutes
Heavy viewers (according to Gerbner) = those who watch 4+ hours
Major findings of cultivation Analysis
Cultivation differential = difference in the percentage giving the ‘tv answer’ within
groups of light and heavy viewers
1. Positive correlation between TV viewing and fear of criminal victimization
- Fear correlates with time spent in front of the tube
2. Perceived activity of police
- Heavy viewers believe that 5% of society is involved with law enforcement
3. General mistrust of people
, - Heavy viewers are suspicious about other people’s motives
How strong is the evidence in favor of the theory?
1. Correlation between TV viewing and fear of criminal victimization can be
reversed
Fear of crime can cause people to watch more TV to reassure themselves that
justice is being served to the victims
So…… does TV affect fear of victimization or the other way around?
Collect data from the same people on more than one occasion over a period of time
(= longitudinal studies)
But it takes a lot of time Cultivation studies of this type are virtually
nonexistent
2. Relationship between Tv viewing and fear of crime mutual
They’re both caused by something else
Ex. People who live in high-crime areas and have a high level of fear tend
to stay inside more. They pass the time by watching TV. Vice versa
3. Cultivation effects tend to be statistically small
-Amount measured is small but effect can be significant
ICS summary 3 – Media ecology, media myths, third person effect
Media ecology
Media ecologists study media environments: seek to understand how people
interact with media and how these shape our culture and daily experiences.
McLuhan’s theory captured in: ‘the medium is the message’
explanation: We think that media as mere channels of message delivery but
according to McLuhan, the media reshapes human experience and exert far more
change in our world. We tend to look at the content normally eventhough
content does not even exist without the medium.
Media = Generic term for all human-invented technology that
extends the range, speed, or change of communication.
Medium = A specific type of media; e.g. a book, newspaper,
radio, telephone
NOT technological abnormality that demands our attention we need to focus
on our everyday experience of technology. ( acc. McLuhan)
Medium
- Extension of our life
- that emphasized the eat > eye alters the ratios of sense perception.
- Society is shaped in accordance with the dominant medium of the day
Media ecology takes up challenge to understand the interplay between all
medium in a culture that changes at blazing speed
, McLuhan accused modern scholars of refusing to acknowledge the revolutionary
impact of electronic media on the sensory experience of the contemporary
society.
Four periods of human history:
1. Tribal age
Hearing is more reliable than seeing because it allowed us to be more
aware of our surroundings and with sight we are limited to direction and
distance.
- Spoken word is immediate and alive
- Spoken word lacks materiality
- Must constantly be shared and passed down
- People have deeper feeling of community
- People have greater awareness of surrounding existence
Alphabet was invented
2. Literate age
- Word on a page detach meaning from the immediacy of contect
- Hearing diminished in value and quality
- Act of reading requires singular focus
- Invention alphabet emergence of mathematics, science and philosophy
- Oppressed people learned to read individual thinkers
3. Print age
- Most important aspect of movable type of information ability to
reproduce
- Is also forerunner of industrial revolution
- Rise of national tongue
- Acc. McLuhan libraries provides readers freedom to be alienated from
others.
4. Electronic age
- Acc. Mcluhan electronic media is retribalizing the human race global
village
- Electronics extend the central nerve system all at once is our state
of being
5. (Digital age)
Cultivation theory
Television is a dominant force of shaping modern society
Storyteller
Violence on tv can affect viewers beliefs about the world around them
Ads on tv can affects viewers perception about health risks of smoking
Popularity of political positions
3 prongs of Gerbner
Each of the prong tells us something different about the world of TV
First prong – Institutional process analysis
Reasons why media produce the messages they produce
- Use: Lurk behind the scenes of media organizations to discover the
policies or practices
Ex. Violence: cheap to produce and universally understood
Second prong – Message system analysis
What messages does the TV transmit?
- Use: quantitative content analysis
Index of violence
Dramatic violence = the overt expression of physical force as part of the plot
”
Rules out: verbal abuse and idle threats
Index stable and alarmingly high
Equal violence, unequal risk
-More than half of prime-time programs contains violence
-Heroes are just as involved with violence as villians
-Inequality Elderly people and children are harmed at a greater rate than
middle age/young people
African Americans and Hispanics are killed or
beate up more than Caucasian
people on TV
- Stats: 50% of the characters are white middle class males, 3 to 1 is male,
10% are children
People on the margins of American society are put in symbolic double jeopardy
Third prong – Cultivation analysis
Carries most electrical current in the theory aka most action
Difference: Message system analysis = dealing with content of TV
Cultivation analysis = dealing with how TV’s content
affects viewers
, Cultivation as gravity field
Cultivation is like the pull of a gravity field the magnitude of TV’s
influence is not the same for every viewer but all are affected by it.
Accessibility principle = When people make judgements about the world they rely on
the smallest bits of information that come to mind most quickly
Ex. For those who consume lots of TV the most accessible information for
making judgements will come from TV shows
Mainstreaming
= The blurring, blending and bending process by which heavy Tv viewers from disparate
groups develop a common outlook through constant exposure to the same images and
labels.
- TV homogenizes the audience
- Pulls those who might have different from each other into a common
perception of reality
Resonance
= Condition that exists when viewers’ real-life environment is like the world of TV;
these viewers are especially susceptible (=sensitive) to TV cultivating power
People whose real-world environment is very much alike with the Tv world Most
Affected
Why? double dose of the same message because it also happens in their lives and on
TV
Effect people are hesitant to for example get out of the house
Research on cultivation analysis
Cultivation takes time, happens gradually
Strategy for performing cultivation analysis survey
Why not experiments? Change due to cultivation can take place over months and years
and experments take place over 30 or 60 minutes
Heavy viewers (according to Gerbner) = those who watch 4+ hours
Major findings of cultivation Analysis
Cultivation differential = difference in the percentage giving the ‘tv answer’ within
groups of light and heavy viewers
1. Positive correlation between TV viewing and fear of criminal victimization
- Fear correlates with time spent in front of the tube
2. Perceived activity of police
- Heavy viewers believe that 5% of society is involved with law enforcement
3. General mistrust of people
, - Heavy viewers are suspicious about other people’s motives
How strong is the evidence in favor of the theory?
1. Correlation between TV viewing and fear of criminal victimization can be
reversed
Fear of crime can cause people to watch more TV to reassure themselves that
justice is being served to the victims
So…… does TV affect fear of victimization or the other way around?
Collect data from the same people on more than one occasion over a period of time
(= longitudinal studies)
But it takes a lot of time Cultivation studies of this type are virtually
nonexistent
2. Relationship between Tv viewing and fear of crime mutual
They’re both caused by something else
Ex. People who live in high-crime areas and have a high level of fear tend
to stay inside more. They pass the time by watching TV. Vice versa
3. Cultivation effects tend to be statistically small
-Amount measured is small but effect can be significant
ICS summary 3 – Media ecology, media myths, third person effect
Media ecology
Media ecologists study media environments: seek to understand how people
interact with media and how these shape our culture and daily experiences.
McLuhan’s theory captured in: ‘the medium is the message’
explanation: We think that media as mere channels of message delivery but
according to McLuhan, the media reshapes human experience and exert far more
change in our world. We tend to look at the content normally eventhough
content does not even exist without the medium.
Media = Generic term for all human-invented technology that
extends the range, speed, or change of communication.
Medium = A specific type of media; e.g. a book, newspaper,
radio, telephone
NOT technological abnormality that demands our attention we need to focus
on our everyday experience of technology. ( acc. McLuhan)
Medium
- Extension of our life
- that emphasized the eat > eye alters the ratios of sense perception.
- Society is shaped in accordance with the dominant medium of the day
Media ecology takes up challenge to understand the interplay between all
medium in a culture that changes at blazing speed
, McLuhan accused modern scholars of refusing to acknowledge the revolutionary
impact of electronic media on the sensory experience of the contemporary
society.
Four periods of human history:
1. Tribal age
Hearing is more reliable than seeing because it allowed us to be more
aware of our surroundings and with sight we are limited to direction and
distance.
- Spoken word is immediate and alive
- Spoken word lacks materiality
- Must constantly be shared and passed down
- People have deeper feeling of community
- People have greater awareness of surrounding existence
Alphabet was invented
2. Literate age
- Word on a page detach meaning from the immediacy of contect
- Hearing diminished in value and quality
- Act of reading requires singular focus
- Invention alphabet emergence of mathematics, science and philosophy
- Oppressed people learned to read individual thinkers
3. Print age
- Most important aspect of movable type of information ability to
reproduce
- Is also forerunner of industrial revolution
- Rise of national tongue
- Acc. McLuhan libraries provides readers freedom to be alienated from
others.
4. Electronic age
- Acc. Mcluhan electronic media is retribalizing the human race global
village
- Electronics extend the central nerve system all at once is our state
of being
5. (Digital age)
