Human personality is formed mainly through relations with other people, the community and society. The process of forming human individuality continues for the whole life. The most intensively the personality is up to the age of 18, as it is the most suitable stage of life for absorbing the knowledge and rules of behavior in the society. Human personality is a concept that expresses the social essence of the person, the complex characterizing human features, properties, relations, moral and spiritual world, formed in the course of self-development, cooperation with social communities and separate individuals.
Teenagers belong to the most sensible category that is easily influenced by any social factors. As the socio-psychological research shows, children before becoming teenagers are fully satisfied with the information about the surrounding world and social life provided by their parents, teachers, or relatives. When a child enters adult social life, he/she needs to enrich his/her knowledge with versatile information. Books as a source of information are used by 29% of teen students, and most of them acquire their knowledge from TV and the Internet.
Traditional media influence public consciousness and human behavior, encouraging them to achieve a particular purpose. In periods of evolutionary development the structure and functions of the media, as a rule, contribute to the stable functioning of the human society. All that people know about human society and the surrounding world in which they live, they learn from the media. On the other hand, the media provides the society with the information that cannot be trusted. People resist its impact, knowing that they are being manipulated. The fact that the media has a tremendous impact on the individual, and often shapes public opinion, is indisputable. The younger generation forms its opinions and tastes under the strong influence of magazines, television and Internet entertainment (Escobar-Chaves, 2005).
In recent decades, television has become of high interest in the families and other social institutions that is connected with its increasing influence on the formation of the personality of children and adolescents. According to sociological surveys, television takes one of the leading places after the educational, social and political institutions due to its influence on the human mind, as an intensive socialization channel. Nowadays, television demonstrates all the violence and cruelty of the modern times. Virtually, all modern dramas, movies, cartoons damage teen’s psyche with violent cinematography. On the one hand, there are many studies that show that viewing violence on television programs and films is related to the subsequent aggression. At the same time, many scholars do not draw the connection between television violence and the teen’s psyche. Such media violence is regarded as a form of psychological pressure on the thoughts, emotions and feelings of individuals, learning and forcing them to think, feel, and have the fear of something, making them do act and behave in a certain way (Fardouly, Diedrichs, Vartanian, & Halliwel, 2015, p. 40).
Media are also the sources vulgar information and pornography. Television broadcasts a lot of erotic films that corrupt and trivialize the youth today. The scary thing is that this platitude, impurity, can be observed not only on television, but also in newspapers, magazines, the Internet, actually, everywhere. With this regard, one can trace the negative impact of television on the sexual life of adolescents. Values, norms and stereotypes of sexual activity, which media broadcasts, is very often far from reality, and orients young people on disenfranchised sexual relations that are not based on mutual feelings of love and responsibility, provoke and stimulate the already increased teenage sexuality (Chakravarty, 2016).
In addition to the negative influence of media on youth behavior, there are several positive aspects. For instance, media keeps young people informed of all the events taking place, reducing hunger for information. It provides authorities and the public with the mutual informing and decreases social tensions. Analysis of the main motives for watching movies and programs showed that students watch TV to be entertained. At the same time, the deep analysis shows that television is a source of information for young people and a targeted way of emotional discharge. Television greatly influences the behavior of young people, making a significant contribution to the character of their dialogue with the outer world (Ruddock, 2013).
Media reveals characteristic features of modern mass culture, its patterns and norms of behavior, which are projected on the youth subcultures and, thus, assigned to teenagers, forming their value orientation and their actual behavior. Television, in this context, plays a significant role in the formation of attitudes of young people. Since young people are quite culturally detached from the older generation, the TV is used to successfully promote the Western way of life and perception of the world. So, TV is one of the sources that forms teens’ values, behavior, morality and vision of the world (Escobar-Chaves, 2005).
Interest in newspapers and magazines, that intend to satisfy not the interests of children, but of adults, usually begins to manifest itself among adolescence. And there is significant quantity and quality of the information available on the pages of periodicals which shape human values, morality and the basic components of culture. Thus, they must include the information appropriate for the people aiming at self-education and self-development.
The press today is, perhaps, in the most unfavorable condition among adolescents comparing to other media. For the last years, young people have found alternative sources of information. That is why periodicals reduce their popularity among adolescents, for instance, visiting Internet websites. In addition, the periodicals have seriously changed the structure of consumption: the circulation of the central media, which in the beginning of 1993 exceeded the total circulation of the local press, now makes up less than one-third of the total circulation of newspapers ((Fardouly, Diedrichs, Vartanian, & Halliwel, 2015, p. 42).
Today, along with video games, the Internet gains its popularity among any age group of people. The experience of the world of open networks, especially, the Internet, allows people to speak about the beginning of a new era in the development of tools and systems of information processing. In such networks, the user perceives himself/herself and is perceived by others as an integral component of a unified information society (Chakravarty, 2016).
One of the negative effects of the global computer network is a widespread variety of information of questionable content. It should be noted that there is information exposure, directly threatening the mental or physical health of a person. Quite often, it forms the moral and psychological atmosphere in society, stimulate the increasing activity of the criminal environment and contribute to the growth of mental disorders. In this case, children become the most vulnerable and unprotected category of the humankind, so they do not see the threat posed by a global network. Statistics is frightening: 9 out of 10 children aged 8 to 15 years are faced with pornography on the Internet, about 17% drop in regularly to restricted resources. The main issue consists in the fact that all kinds of information are open for children, so they have access to every possible source with no regard to their age (Raney, 2016).
The child may accidentally visit a website with colorful advertisements of drugs or other forbidden substances that attract child’s attention. Quite often, children may visit the resources full of advertisements and photos of naked human bodies that appear in the pop-up ad windows. According to a recent survey, today's young people are at risk of visiting unwanted websites, downloading illegal software or being engaged in chat with strangers. The limited use of computers at schools is strict and brings no harm for child’s psyche. The main load of information is perceived at home, when the child surfs the Internet. This is because the administration of the educational institution strictly controls the use of the computers by teens at schools, while teens suffer from the negative impact of forbidden information surfing the Internet at home that happens because of lack of parents’ attention and control (Escobar-Chaves, 2005).
Advantages of the Internet lie in the fact that the network offers an educational and rewarding experience, the proper use of which can improve child’s performance at school or college. But there are some disadvantages, such as negative impact of inaccurate and inappropriate information on children and adolescents. For instance, there are websites devoted to pornography, pyrotechnics, suicide, drugs. According to statistics, this is the biggest risk to meet dangerous people in chat rooms and communicate with them for a long time. Teens may enter radical political groups, satanic cult communities, network orgy. These groups exist in the real world, but it is much easier for teen to take part in their gatherings, sitting at their computer at home (Chakravarty, 2016).
Many teens are involved in gambling. Even simple toys do irreparable harm, but video games and online gaming are quite dangerous even for adults. Video games involve teens in virtual and unreal world, and lasting gaming may cause perverted vision of the reality. Constant gaming leads also to the degradation processes of human mind. Online gaming is much more dangerous, as it involves teens in spending real money, and they may be even engaged in real crimes (Strickland, 2016).
It is impossible to prohibit the child to have the access to the Internet, but it is quite possible to prevent the negative effects of the illiterate and foolish use of the inappropriate Internet resources. At the same time, parents, teachers state that the computer is increasingly replacing the book out of teenage life and reduces teens’ socializing with their peers. The computer gives them more options than the book, allows young people go to the world of the unreal, fantastic life that is far from reality (Escobar-Chaves, 2005).
Generally speaking, all kinds of media have the same purposes. First of all, it is the promotion of entertainment as the goal of life, clubs, advertising, discos and other parties. Close to it is the propaganda of sex as a means of entertainment, it calls for recognition of public opinion about traditional heterosexual relationships and marriages as well as various perspectives on homosexual relations, their approval in the society and impact on the formation of teens’ psyche. Another point consists in a shocking propaganda of outrageous fashion with protrusion of the attributes of various subcultures, fashion discos, unisex, all kinds of stamping: tattoos, shaved heads, piercing in ears, eyebrows, tongues, noses. Another point concerns promotion of aggressive behavior and justifying the crime. These factors confuse teenagers and disorientate them in life. The line between the real and imaginary is dissolved, the concepts of good and bad are mixed. Another trend is the creation of idols, and pop stars play an important role in this case. Endless details of their fairy life, fantastic fees, fans, description of amorous adventures of deviant actions provide an example for teenagers to follow. Quite often, teenagers copy their idols in everything, even in taking drugs, drinking alcohol, smoking and so on, as teenagers do not realize that the life of pop stars is quite different from the life of simple children.
The increasing financial and property stratification of society and the growth of social intolerance and aggression lead to the criminal activity, participation in criminal groups is becoming in the eyes of teens as a socially prestige occupation. Lack of adequate information policy of the state oriented on media communication to achieve the purposes of national security, protect society from crime, improve the level of moral and legal culture of the population, leads to the increasing criminal activity (Escobar-Chaves, 2005).
Unfortunately, the media manipulates the mass consciousness, imposes certain forms of behavior, both intimidating and enticing attributes of sweet life. In this regard, juveniles suffer from inappropriate information and cannot be got ready for the adult life. The propagation conditions in the society increase tolerance to violation of citizens' moral and criminal prohibitions.
Today the US, UK, France and some other economically developed countries have established quite a strict control over information available to children and creates an obstacle for the materials which may cause irreparable harm to the teenage developing personality. This policy is carried out directly at the state level, through the publication of the legislative bodies of various kinds of regulations. Reasonable censorship in this area can bring positive results.
The need for constant information communication and constant influx of information from various media is necessary for a person in order to fulfill certain goals such as orientation in the current situation and the social environment, socialization in the society, the development of general outlook, enhancing the intellectual level of the person as a whole, solving everyday problems, professional development ((Fardouly, Diedrichs, Vartanian, & Halliwel, 2015, p. 38).
Summing up the functions and influence of media on human nature, it is worth mentioning positive and negative impact of the media on the human being. Speaking about the positive impact, one must first note the informational and educational role of the media. The development of electronic media systems has improved an entirely new kind of communication and self-realization. The information provided by the media gives teenagers an opportunity to express themselves and their individuality, broaden their horizon, deepen their knowledge about the surrounding world (Escobar-Chaves, 2005).
As any phenomenon, media has negative impact on the juveniles. It is widely known that the saturation of data media demonstrates lots of acts of aggression, violence, and brutality. Criminal chronicle takes one of the leading places in the category of modern television. No wonder that the media is called the fourth power. Media may be even the first power because it has a strong impact on the tastes and preferences of millions of people, even stronger than that of the family, schools and other public institutions. Media activity has a large impact on the socio-psychological and moral character of each of the members of this society, because any new information coming through media channels, bears repeatedly repeated political orientations and values which are fixed in people's minds.
Development and formation of adolescent's personality comes in contact with the outside world. And today, when on the one hand, people are more likely to think about educating, on the other has, the influence of the media has increased as a result of technological progress. To date, the impact of media on the education of adolescents is an urgent problem, and is one of the primary tasks of pedagogy. It is important to note that there is a great risk that the development of the media, the development of new information technologies will outstrip the development of pedagogy. In fact, pedagogy provides children with traditional views on the world and life, and media gives an opportunity to observe the reality from different perspective. Bright advertisements of drugs, alcohol, junk food lead to substance abuse, obesity, involve teenagers in devil communities, develop video game addiction and even make teens commit crimes. It is necessary to remember that despite of educative and informative functions media has a number of disadvantages. That is why it is important to filter the information and demand the correct information policy in order to protect teens from inappropriate destructive information.
References
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Escobar-Chaves, S., Tortolero, S., Markham, C., Low, B., Eitel, P., and Thickstun, P. (2005).
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