Great Transitions: Preparing Adolescents for a New Century

Chapter Seven: Redirecting the Pervasive Power of the Media

The adolescent's world cannot be understood without considering the enormous power of the mass media, especially television, but also movies and popular music. Together with the increasing penetration of cable television, videocassette recorders, and computers in American homes and schools, these electronic conduits for programming and advertising have become strong competitors to the traditional societal institutions in shaping young people's attitudes and values.

Even greater media influences may emerge as the United States develops a high-speed global "information superhighway," capable of combining different information technologies into a single medium of communication. As the potential--both positive and negative--of these new media unfolds, it seems likely that cyberspace will have the capacity to transform education, health care, and many other vital aspects of life.

For the near future, however, television's cheaper price, accessibility, and convenience virtually guarantee its dominion in American homes and much of the world.

Adolescents unquestionably spend a great deal of time watching television: twenty-two hours a week on average, and for some individuals as many as sixty. Television viewing peaks around age twelve and then declines through the later teen years relative to competing media, such as radio and music, and social life. The question of what young adolescents are learning from the media, particularly television, should therefore be of the deepest concern to families and communities.

THE IMPACT OF TELEVISION ON YOUNG ADOLESCENTS
Our understanding of television's role in shaping adolescents' psychological and cognitive development is still incomplete, but certain of its effects on children have been established from research. We know, for example, that passive consumption of commercial television can lead to attention deficits, nonreflective thinking, poor decision making, and, in some young minds, confusion between external reality and packaged representations. There is, moreover, a negative relationship between heavy viewing of entertainment television and academic achievement, notably on reading tests. Furthermore, the evidence is considerable that heavy viewing of gratuitously violent content on television contributes to aggressive feelings and behavior.

Adolescents who spend more than five hours a day sitting in front of the television set are more likely to become obese than their counterparts who watch less than an hour. Heavy television viewers are not only less active, they tend to consume the same food products displayed on the screen, which are high in sugar, fat, and sodium. Alternatively, in some girls, the ideal of thinness portrayed in TV programs can contribute to the development of eating disorders such as bulimia and anorexia.

There is arguably an opportunity cost in the amount of time spent in solitary, passive television watching. Teenagers glued to the television set are not participating in social or cultural events, excursions, and outdoor games or church, school, or musical groups; they are not engaged in creative activities such as writing or improving a skill.

TAPPING THE MEDIA'S CONSTRUCTIVE POTENTIAL
Despite the media's frequently cited negative influences, their potential to affect adolescents' lives for the better is great indeed. Even if, as now used, television, videocassettes, music videos, and radio are often a distraction from school and other learning opportunities, they can also be powerful tools for teaching a wide range of cognitive and social skills. They can provide examples of compassionate understanding, nonviolent problem solving, and decent intergroup relations. They can portray human diversity while highlighting shared experience. They can model examples of healthy development in childhood and early adolescence that increase public understanding of what it takes to raise competent youth.

To improve the constructive role of the mass media in fostering the education and health of young adolescents, the Carnegie Council suggests the following measures:

Increase Media Literacy for the Information Age
Adolescents currently represent a $230 billion annual consumer market for products and are aggressively targeted by advertisers. The capacity of young adolescents to make sense of the commercial messages they receive from this array of powerful influences, and to counter social or peer norms that reinforce health-damaging messages, is essential to their development. Parents, schools, and community organizations should initiate discussions with young people about the mass media and imbue them with critical habits of mind so they can be informed and effective users of technology, restoring personal control.

Media literacy is a required part of the language arts curriculum for grades seven through twelve in Great Britain, Canada, Australia, and Spain. In contrast, teacher education, curricula, and community centers aimed at fostering media literacy in the United States are in their infancy. The state of New Mexico has adopted media literacy as a basic skill and pioneered a comprehensive media literacy program from kindergarten through grade twelve. North Carolina has included media literacy in both its English and information skills curricula. Efforts such as these deserve widespread consideration by families, schools, and youth-serving organizations as an integral part of education for democratic citizenship.

Foster Cooperative Consultations with the Entertainment Industry
Efforts to bring together media professionals on a regular basis with experts in health, education, and adolescent development to discuss responsible depictions of sexuality and violence have made some headway, largely through the efforts of Mediascope, Advocates for Youth, and similar public interest organizations. As a result of such outreach efforts, the television and movie industry has virtually eliminated cigarette smoking from the screen, and the news media have introduced informative segments on the benefits of healthy diets and physical exercise. Mediascope is developing an ethics curriculum on violence to be used in courses that train film students. It is also issuing annual reports to help consumers make more informed choices about what they and their families watch.

Additionally, prosocial television programs aimed at adolescents, such DeGrassi Junior High and In the Mix, have made serious efforts to address family conflict, emotional and physical abuse, drug abuse, AIDS, depression, and sexuality.

Build Use of Media into Health Promotion Campaigns
The use of media in the dissemination of health information has been shown to increase the effectiveness of comprehensive health promotion initiatives. Through public service announcements, kits on weight loss and smoking cessation, educational programming, and the like, media strategies in some community wide health promotion campaigns have helped to prevent cardiovascular disease, reduce the consumption of legal and illegal drugs, and build community norms for healthy behavior.

Promote Self-Regulation by the Entertainment Industry
Despite three decades of public debate, films, television, and certain forms of music have become increasingly more violent and often demeaning of women and other groups. Although there has been some recent curtailment of such practices, in the absence of strong public demand for change there will likely be little appreciable advance in the deglamorization of sex and violence. The Federal Communications Commission requires television stations to broadcast educational children's programming as a condition of license renewal. The regulations do not include standards for programming content or for the number of broadcast hours involved. Some public interest groups are currently seeking measures requiring stations to broadcast seven hours of children's educational programming a week.

In response to public pressure and debate, media organizations may well begin to adopt self-regulatory strategies in order to avoid further regulation by government. Both the television cable networks and the video game industry, for example, have unveiled rating systems and advisories that will allow parents more control over what their children watch. The Motion Picture Association of America has reacted to public concern by releasing, for the first time, limited explanations of the reasons for its ratings of individual films. In addition, new technologies are being developed that could enable consumers to block out shows with specific unwanted content.

Ensure Equitable Access to the New Information Technologies
The emergence of a new digital electronics world via the information superhighway will provide unprecedented opportunities to shape policies and practices that ensure the equitable access of all children and adolescents to the highest-quality educational programs. Widespread public education about the positive potential and the negative consequences of leading-edge communications technologies and software aimed at youth must, therefore, become a high priority for advocates of healthy youth development.

The flow of personal computers into American homes and schools, furthermore, should provide new opportunities to create programs that are both educational and engaging. Health and educational professionals should act now to collaborate with software designers in developing interactive programs that offer young people rewarding learning experiences.

In sum, the media and entertainment industries, through their programs and in other ways, could do much to enhance the learning, competence, and character of young adolescents. They could work with families, schools, and other key institutions to encourage health-promoting practices and provide positive role models for future generations of youth who will look to the media for the directions their adult life might take.

Go to Chapter 8
Return to Chapter 6
Return to Great Transitions table of contents