Young People and the Media Choice
Introduction and Thesis Statement
Media has become an integrant part of our everyday life, being present in various forms, delivered through various vehicles in any moment we need it, and even when we do not necessarily require its services. It accomplishes a social role, serving as an important information tool, but also as entertainment, interaction and a significant educational tool. Nevertheless, utilized inappropriately, mass media can also have negative effects on society, affecting its users because of an excessive consumption or because of inadequate media programs consumption. Media has the strength to manipulate masses, to control and determine ways of thinking and to change attitudes and behaviors. For youngsters, media can be a very helpful vehicle for achieving information and for contributing to their education, but in the same time, it can have severe consequences on their social, cognitive and behavioral development.
Supporting Paragraphs
Nowadays everybody has full access to media 24/7. A walk in the subway allows for media consumption. Daily, people travelling with the subway or any other commune transportation vehicle have their eyes on their cellphone, easily gliding their fingers on the cellphone’s screen in order to continue playing a game, or to read an online article, or to enter social media websites to check who has checked their profile and what else is going on in that virtual reality space called Facebook or Twitter, or LinkedIn and so on. Technological advancements have created the possibility for various media programs to be easily accessible through multiple devices that have become must have gadgets, defining a social condition and in the same time setting a statement regarding the users’ ability to use high tech and to be in – style with the latest trends in technology. Of course, youngsters are the ones mostly influenced by how the technological advancements have facilitated mass media to enter so deep into people’s daily routine. Because “the medium is the message”, the vehicles through which people access various media formats have a tremendous significance on the way these formats are received. Tablets, electronic books, i-phones, or other smartphones, facilitate the entrance of various messages in youngsters’ daily life. From this point on, they are the ones who control the content to which they have access.
Practically, the electronic environment allows access to any type of media content and programs. Informational content (news and articles), educational programs (books, courses, conferences, etc.), entertainment (online movies and music, cartoons, video games, etc.) or interaction (emailing, chatting with friends and acquaintances on various social media platforms, interacting with people with the same interests on diverse groups of commune interests, online dating, etc.), all these and much more are available through the use of online media, brought to users through various devices, which are more and more accessible. The easy access to any online media content allows youngsters to use media as a source of information, education or for engaging in various entertainment programs or to interact with others. At a young age, however, education and achieving information through their mobile gadgets or from their home computers and even from their TV set, fall on the second place, because teenagers absorb more and better the entertaining or the social media interaction as media content and programs, as they are more engaging and more interactive.
Entertainment can take various forms, as mentioned above, facilitating youngsters’ access to violence, aggressive, or sexual content. Being exposed to violence and aggression, as acts promoted in movies, videos, or video games that they consume, youngsters will tend to associate violence and aggression with normal modalities for solving problems or for interacting with others. Similarly, watching porn or sexual content programs, young people can form wrong perceptions regarding gender relations or can develop sexual frustrations or excessive sexuality and inadequate social conduct, driven by their sexual desires, which they absorb from the media programs that they consume. Youngsters tend to identify themselves with people they appreciate, either from their immediate proximity (family, friends, tutors, etc.), either from a virtual reality (movie stars or video games heroes or villains). Associating themselves with figures that promote violence and aggression, a vulgar vocabulary and/or sexual appeal as ways of communicating, interacting with others or showing their “coolness”, they can develop the same features, and this will have a significant impact on how they will develop from a behavioral, social or cognitive point of view. Violent media consumption leads to developing into violent personality, while sexual content programs determine the accumulation of sexual desires or frustrations, which will deform the youngsters’ perception about reality and their personality development.
Likewise, access to social media can also influence youngsters’ personality development. Hanging out with friends, acquaintances or unknown people in the virtual medium more than in the real life can lead to developing problems regarding the social interaction, to inability to connect and develop real life relationships with people and to self – marginalization and isolation from the society, resulting into the formation of an asocial personality. Social media and the possibility of connecting with people from all the corners of the world can have a positive impact upon young people’s personality development, because it can facilitate interaction between more cultures, and they can learn that there are other solutions for any problem or situation, viewed by people with different perceptions and different cultural and social background. Likewise, this can bring youngsters to connect with various people with different nationalities, races, ethnicities, gender, religions, etc., determining them to accept and to embrace diversity through direct interaction (although through media’s instrumentality). On the other side of the social media, there is the possibility to chat and to date online. Unfortunately, this is a hidden face of social media, because there can be anybody behind an online ID such as “lovelyeyesblues”, from a child to a senior, who want to pass for sexy people wanting to engage in online dating or dirty talking and other virtual actions. This can even encourage online prostitution, which for sure will influence the social and sexual development of young people.
The way the youngsters use media impacts their development. The media programs and content that they consume, the time they spent on various media contents and the locations they access media content (transportation, while walking, in the classroom, while doing homework, etc.) can affect their social behavior, their learning and their personalities, overall. While media can have positive effect on young people, it can also have negative impact, determining them to become violent, aggressive or sex addict, because of the content that they consume. Parents’ and educators’ involvement in evaluating what the youngsters follow and consume in terms of media programs (what type of movies, what type of games, what kind of music, whom they communicate online, in what manner, etc.) should not be perceived as a violation of their privacy, but as a way of supervising the young people, keeping them away from content that may negatively affect their personality development, while promoting positive content media instead. Keeping youngsters busy with various choruses will not only limit their time exposure on violent or sexual content media, but will also increase their responsibility. Youth represent a difficult period, a period of contradictions. This is why teenagers must be determined to follow educative or informative content on media instead of entertaining or engaging too much in social media, but they must consider that it is their own choice for doing that, not that somebody recommends them or worse, imposes them to do that. This is why, it is important for educators and parents to show them the fun part of engaging in informative or educational content online, indicating also the possible benefits of replacing entertainment and social media with information and educational programs, so that young people can perceive the immediate gratifications.
Conclusion
The easy access of online media in young people’s daily routine affects the way they develop. Because of the rapid development of the technology, media is available at any time, any place, through various devices and youngsters are the main targets of these devices, which facilitate the access to various media content, inclusive to violence, nudity or sexuality. Media allows for the consumption of programs with informational, educative, entertaining or social interaction content, and young people have the freedom to choose what they want to consume in terms of media. Because of their interactive and engaging features, they prefer entertaining programs and social media, which can deform their characters. Parents and educators are responsible for evaluating and monitoring the media content that they follow, to replace the interactive and social media content with informative and educational programs and to determine the young people to be more responsible, by involving them in various choruses or activities outside the virtual world, right into reality, determining them to feel life from outside their mobile phones, or from their PC’s, laptops or tablets’ screens.
