“GROWING UNDER THE SHADOW OF
MASS-MEDIA: EXPLORATIONS INTO FAMILY LIVES & PSYCHO-SOCIAL
WELL-BEING”
Innovative Research
Project Submitted to
University of Delhi
Project
Code : BRAC-101
By
Dr. Navin Kumar Dr.
Indiwar Mishra Bishnu
Mohan Dass
Investigator 1; Investigator
2 Investigaotor
3
Principal
Investigator
Dr. G.K. Arora Prof.
N.K. Chadha
Principal Mentor
Bhim
Rao Ambedkar College
Yamuna
Vihar, Delhi – 94
(University
of Delhi)
Academic
Session: 2012-2013
TEACHER
RESEARCHER’S:
1.
Dr.
Navin Kumar
(Co-ordinator),
Associate Prof., Deptt. Of Psychology
B.R. Ambedkar
College
2.
Dr.
Indiwar Mishra
Associate Prof.,
Deptt. Of Psychology
B.R. Ambedkar
College
3.
Bishnu
Mohan Dass Dr. Navin Kumar
Associate Prof.,
Deptt. Of Social Work
B.R. Ambedkar
College
INNOVATIVE STUDENT RESEARCHER’S
1. Durgesh Ojha
(Student
Co-ordinaator)
2. Sonali
Ranjan tt. Of Social Work
(Student
Convener)
3. Ajay Kumar
4. Charvi Sharma
5. Prashansha Sharma
6. Nikita Jain
7. Sanchita Johri
8. Megha Taragi
9. Mayank Dubey
10. Kanchan
Bhardwaj
CONTENTS
Ø ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Ø CHAPETR 1: Introduction and Review
Of Literature
Ø CHAPTER 2: Methodology and
Objectives
Ø CHAPTER 3:
Results
Ø CHAPTER 4: Discussion And
Conclusion
Ø CHAPTER 5: References
Ø APPENDICES
1.
Personal Information
2.
Social Well Being Scale
3.
Media – Map Questionnaire
(Hindi/English)
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I
wish to express my gratitude to a number of persons who contributed to
realization of this innovative research journey entitled “Growing Under the
Shadow of Mass-Media: Explorations into Family Lives & Psycho-Social
Well-being” first and foremost to the Vice Chancellor Prof. Dinesh Singh who
opened the platform for meaningful research to the college teachers. I extend
my sincere thanks to Dr. G.K. Arora principal for his motivating and supportive
role throughout this journey of this project. I also record my personal thanks
to the Mentor Prof. N.K. Chadha who helped me at every step of this endeavor. I
would like to thank Prof. Girishwar Mishra for his valuable academic advice at
every stage of this research. I would like to thank Prof. Anand Prakash who
always encouraged me to do this work meaningfully. Dr. Ritesh Singh, Dr.
Sangeet Ragi and Dr. Neeraj Tyagi always helped me and my students in the
academic congress and their encouragement truly a truly memorable experience.
Both my college teacher Researchers’ Dr. Indiwar Mishra and Bishnu Mohan Dass stood
like a pillar and working as a team with them was unique experience.
I would like to thank my son Kanishka
Singh, daughter Kriti Singh and wife Swati for their emotional and academic
support whenever I required it. I would like to record my thanks to Amrendra
Kumar, Sunil Gupta, Ajay Maurya and Swati Gaur who always helped me in variety
of ways at different stages of this work. All my innovative students that
include Durgesh, Sonali, Charvi, Prashansha, Ajay, Mayank, Nikita, Megha,
Sanchita and kanchan performed like gems and I would minimize their magnanimity
if I quantify it through words and any amount of accolade will be less as
compared to their commitment, devotion, trust and hardwork. I thank on behalf
of my team of researchers and wish them all a colourful future. I also wish to
thank Pankaj Ahlawat, Bhawani Ji, Joginder Solanki, Ramkumar and Rabindra Ji.
All the great minds who visited our college for the seminar on this subject
also acted as a sourec of inspiration. Dr. Rekha Rani, Nisha Choudhary and members of
organizing committee of seminar need special mention that made this work
diverse and meaningful. I thank Mr. Lokesh who always reached on time at
research centre of the college whenever I required him.
Several media experts like Uday Sahay,
Sanjay Nandan, and Mr. Amrendra Kumar of U.G.C. also contributed positively to
this initiative. I also thank all my colleagues in the college and other people
who may have contributed toward the realization of this objective.
CHAPTER – 1
INTRODUCTION
AND
REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Our
everyday lives are so immersed with the shadow of mass media that modern
society is dominated and widely permeated by the mass media produced realities.
Mass media produced images and activities enter into our lives in profound ways
and it also influences our understanding of ourselves and the social world.
Mass media is not a singular entity and it constitutes a whole range of
technology, television, mobile phones, internet, digital technology, and
computers and so on. The stages of media technology did not evolve
spontaneously rather its development was closely tied with the parallel
developments in social and economic realms. Various scholars and critics of
media studies highlighted the realities at different point of time understood
in their perspective time-frame. Foucault pointed out, discourse is not fixed
for all the time and new discursive practices emerge with the passage of new
time. The emergence of media landscape has been attributed to various factors
at different point of time and few potent factors listed include
industrialization, urbanization, demarcation of work and leisure, spread of
consumer culture and loss of traditional community living, loss of joint-family
system.
Marshall Mcluhan’s understanding
media (1964) described medium as either “hot” or “cool”. Power dynamics of
cinema as s cultural apparatus was highlighted by Marxism, feminism and
psychoanalysis. Social Construction theory of media technologies (Hall 1980/1991),
cultural theory developed by (Erossberg, 1982), cultural historian (Lipsitz),
television scholar (Fiske and Hartley, 1989) and feminist scholar (Radway,
1984) highlighted the role of mass media through their viewpoints. The quest
for profit maximization led to a search for new markets that included untapped
populations, mass audience, marginalized groups and emergent social identities.
In the 1990’s the global circulation of “Image centered and narrative strips of
reality” called media scapes (1990) became a focal point of media analysis. The
convergent of traditional media like films and televisions and contemporary
media like computers and cell-phones provided a platform for speed
interactivity among its users. For Henry Jenkins this new prosumer experience
broaden the terms of our access to media, and serve as a springboard for more
explicitly political activities. The emergence of 500 channels online blogs,
social networking sites and reality T.V. shows sets the stage for new kind of
interaction among its users. The events of Egypt soon became a talking point in
New Delhi and incidents of New Delhi soon became global news.
This evolution of mass media can be
organized into prominent domains of culture, technology representation, market,
identity and citizenship. Other concepts of gender, large middle class
population, children and underprivileged sections also need to be understood to
gain a critical perspective of mass media and well-being. Mass media can
themselves as representative of truth-telling but the reality tells us a
different story. All mass cultures try to monopolize the few production
centers, try to produce identical products ignoring the particular and
highlighting the false identity of universal.
The society in order to dominate and
legitimize always speaks of technical rationality ignoring the social
rationality. The talent which conforms to the technical domination is only
allowed to be expressed which limits itself to standardization and the rest
expressing logic of work and individual consciousness is easily ignored. Mass
Media research organization classifies people in statistical terms of red,
green, blue according to the income they generate. The similar version of mass
produced items such as vehicles, television sets are more illusionary in
nature, the synchronization between word, images and music is so created that
it blurs the boundary between projected difference and actual difference. No
wonder people feel very happy to buy watches worn by models and that satisfies
a sense of psychological investment. According to Kantian schematism the
sensuous multiplicity denies access to fundamental concepts or pure reason.
Every cultural production and formation is a reservoir of humanity’s illusions
as well as the expression of their expectations, Psycho-social reality, hopes,
dreams and being represented through the lens of mass-media. The role of
scientific enquiry should aim to decipher the semantic contents scattered
through the discourse of the mass. The growth of mass-media has also led to
hyper-consumerism in the world of abundant commodities with the invention of
industrialized mass-production. It is difficult to find an antology of origin
and authenticity in terms of ideas and products. These techniques if instant
and mass production detaches the reproduced object from the domain of
tradition. Public sphere as a space of reasoned communicative exchanges has
become more publicity oriented than being more public-oriented. The emergence
of critical thinking and development of a public space of reason indicates a
paradigm shift with the advent of mass-media driven publicity i.e.
pre-dominantly mechanical. Mass-media also play an important in the shaping of
world view and constitutes our communicative grammar that also serves to construct
our private views and interests. The distinction between myth and reality gets
blurred due to continuous flow of information established through institutional
channels of linguistic communication.
How the growth of our autonomy is
being constructed depends on how we are raised in the culture that frames our
choices and the institutional guarantees that facilitate choosing and leading
an autonomous life. Are we able to create a rational life world that enables
childhood socialization to navigate the learning diversity and what they are
accomplishes with?
Autonomy of a person can be affected
by condition of individual development (education, upbringing, material
resources) and demands of social institutions largely guided by mass media that
burden capacitates for self-steering that encourages or discourages critical
reflection. The development of authentic identity and autonomous self-hood or
making sense of one’s actions, feelings, thoughts, desires and experiences
requires less ambiguity in term who one is and who one wants to be.
Authenticity in a society can be accessed on the basis of how the life in
general fit or misfit into overall life activity. Validity claims in order to
be recognized by others created by media the gap between this is what I am and
this is what I ought to be has increased considerably in the recent past. From
being a distant participant, people become co-participants to certain
activities programmed by mass media and ultimately turning out to be active
participants. We can always notice a radical departure in the habits of
people’s engagements, whether it is case of mobile phones, internet or watching
of cricket matches. Creative art forms which can produce autonomous and
critical spirit is on the gradual process of demise and popular art forms
manipulating and colonizing the leisure time of the mass is being consciously
promoted. Suffering and disturbed home life is presented in a manner that
majority of family members are unhappy. For the consumer there is hardly
anything left apply and dreamy idealism of art is repeatedly presented to the
consumers. Through totality the culture industry of mass media the works of
art, music and texts have blurred the awareness of details in public psyche.
The concept of holistic recreation is filtered and processes of commodification
of art has occupied a central character.
Popular
culture is also an important extension of mass-media dominated life-style.
According to historian Raman Gutierrez observes, the term “popular culture” is
a description crafted exclusively from the outside. Particular image, icons try
to establish dominance among the audience through electronically transmitted
communication. Deliberate use of sub-cultural slang reduces the authority of
meaningful words and replaces it with an appreciation of the inevitable
metaphrocity of language. Melodrama, empathy, immediacy and emotion forms the
core components of narratives mostly produced by the mass media replacing
conventional narratives and reasoned discourse with broad physical gesture and
more such discourages are expressed through binary oppositions of good and evil
and plots surrounded more by fate and sudden reserves than by human action.
Literary
critic Mikhail Bakhtin identifies sensibilities as the essence of carnival-ritualized
celebrations oriented around the passions of plentitude, inversions of the
social order and making laughter designed to “uncrown power”. Some of the
prominent form of expression highlighted through popular culture and like
constituting the body as a site for decoration and style, valorizing the street
as a locus of creativity and sociality and inverting dominant icons to affirm a
prestige from below. Italian Marxit Antonio Gramsci maintains that elites rule
not merely by force but by “managed consent” as well, that they form
“historical blocks” with other groups that make existing power relations appear
natural and just. Culture acts as a rehearsal for politics and internalizing
the dominant culture norms are seen as necessary and inevitable with the help
of mass media.
The coded indirect and allegorical aspects of
popular and commercial culture refuse to discuss things in critical fashion
refuse to isolate art from lived experience.
It
is not very easy to discard any popular medium as well? The number of people
who condemn television or other electronic mediums have exceeded on far more
numbers. Television and other electronic mediums have also been able to present
the illusion of intimacy, intervening into family relations, interpersonal
relations that characterize our day to day life. It has occupied a primary
discursive medium of our culture, entertainment, news, sports, and education
occupying major space in our public and private life. Society is functioning:
whether it is functioning at its optimum or is it functioning as a escape
debasing successful functioning of the society needs to be unraveled.
Electronic
mediums of communication guided by emotions and empathy working through ritual,
repetition and its core vocabulary reflects its role as a therapeutic voice
ministering to the anxieties and fear of public-mass. These mediums also
highlight and focus more on private existence domains rather than public
existence domains.
Interesting
conversations takes place on social media sites through images or video that
becomes tokens to initiate or maintain a conversation.
Recent
use of digital media and march of technological progress has led to a stage of
technological determinism.
Significant
percent of our population navigate their everyday life activities with the help
of mass media. Most of the products of our daily life are also determined by
mass produced goods chosen with the help of mass media. Most of the products of
daily use as well as of critical importance make their digital appearances in
the form of Myspace, You-tube, Orkut, Flicker and occupy a major space in our
opinion. Shaping and decision-making our inter-personal activities are mostly
done with the help of mass-media gadgets. To divert the attention of people for
recreational activities television spectatorship increased to get relaxed at
home for the people at home. Even women folk at home could relate to the text
of television despite distractions of cleaning, cooking and child-rearing.
The
programme of television are so scheduled that any person who wants to view may
watch programmes at different timing and even such programmes can be stored for
later viewing. Not having a television set at home is almost unimaginable these
days and integration of television in our daily life seems to have reached the
stage of near totality. Each person of different age group adapted to
television viewing according to their interest and relating to their projected
dreams in real life. In the initial few years of television entering our houses
a kind of value debate came into existence but very soon they disappeared being
minority within a very short span of time middle class opted as a most sought
after commodity at their homes. T became an appliance of consumer luxury to
consumer necessity becoming a predominant gadget of projecting everyday
concerns of our social and family life.
Television
is also a heuristic instrument in the philosophical exploration of place,
materiality and technology which is not recognized in our day to day life.
Television has become fully integrated into our social and private life and
components of attitude and behavior modification are widely influenced by this.
Television viewing also presents an ambivalent position where a viewer is
confused about the transfer of attraction in term if its advantage and
disadvantages.
The
place of the screen:
The antological
conception of place is, simply the idea of place as dwelling or in Heideggers
word’s place as “the house of being”. Heidegger develops this idea not only in
the canonical essay “Building Dwelling Thinking” in which human and environment
harmonize at a Black Forest Farmhouse, but also in a less frequently cited
piece entitled “An antological consideration of place”. Heidegger approaches
place as an essential concept for thinking through “the relationship between
the antological dimension of being and the political structure of human
existence”.
However Weber presents a different
theoretical application of notion of place to the relationship between the T.V.
set and its environment. Weber described that television ultimately “takes
place” a term that deftly links medium’s present-tense temporality to its
spatial problematic. Invoking the live transmission construction of a place for
the viewer and its representation of space binding as a process, he proposes
that television upsets the antology of place because it place it takes place in
at least three places “at once” 1) In the place (or places) where those images
and sounds are recorded 2) In the place (or places) where those images and
sounds are received and 3) In the place (or places) in between the unity of
television as a medium of presentation thus involves a simultaneity that is
highly ambivalent. It overcomes spatial distance but only by splitting the
unity of place and with it the unity of everything that defines its identity
with respect to place: events, bodies, subjects. Television does not simply
render the distant present: rather it intervenes in the experiences of space
and time via three distinct, relatively autonomous warping operations. T.V.’s
technological specificity is its ability to alter the fixity of place, to map a
different kind of topography. A T.V. aerial protrudes from the roof the Black
Forest Farmhouse and fabric of space and time are ripped asunder.
Mobile
Phone:
With the growing number of mobiles
the behavioral aspects has had sweeping effects on the lives of individual. The
phenomenology of individuals in social and personal spheres has also changed a
lot. The individual present and equipped with a mobile is split into two, they
are present in body but their attention, mind and senses are drawn elsewhere
with a ring by their communication network. People are not very sure of their
own accessibility at a place at a given point of time as a ring from virtual
communication may require his/her presence to a different location that too
within no time. What actually happens that people decide is to prefer their own
life-styles are navigated to depend on a sense of belonging determined by
others.
What is affect in actuality is that
our sense of loyalty to places, persons, sense of identification, familiarity,
stability, and security so on is compromised to a large extent. People spend
less and less time with engaging intrapersonal and interpersonal activities and
this same nostalgia feeling has also become considerably drawn with advent of
mobile phones. The less close relation that people have today with their homes
actually lacerates affective equilibrium not only at generic psychological
level, but also at the deep structure of imagination. The home infact brings up
images of the sacred space and paradise like centre inside the constellation of
intimacy. This separation pain of being away from your home is easily replaced
by the phones occupying a space of mobile home which it can’t be substitute for
the same sense of belonging.
Uncontrolled
Appropriation of Public Space:
With the increased use of mobile
phones, illegal appropriation of public space has begun. For example, if you
are travelling in a train, fellow passengers occupy the whole public space and
discuss all sorts of things as if it belonged to their private domain. People
inhabiting those public spaces hesitate to show their reactions to the
strangers and taking advantage of this situation mobile speaking continue to
occupy such places in an undemocratic manner. No set of laws or norms are
prescribed to describe permissible limits and this inference continues in
sacred religious place, educational institutions and more important in the
hospitals where patients recovery process is affected. There are no restrictions
in place to protect public good over the individual and not speaking too loud
during night hours, limiting noise level on duration of talk is also largely
ungoverned. This new set of problem created by the use of communicative
instruments called mobile is not only a question of aesthetics of good behavior
but also an ethical, legal and health problems. It is also true that mobile
phone also compensates a temporary loss of autonomy and insecurity with
possibility of regaining of one’s own stability.
Cell
Democracy:
The
modification of one’s relation with space through the widespread use of the
mobile has become the premise which will also illuminate the role of this
instrument in the evolution of democratic society (Duttan, 1999). Fixed phones
entered the people’s home without any difference of race, language, economic
status. In the absence of a mobile phone-book it enables people to find and be
found by those closest to them, in other words by a very limited social
network. Whereas the fixed phone telephone directory describes name, surname,
profession, locality enabling the new-corner to city to know people of their
interest. The situation has become particularly deplorable that a whole lot of
cynicism has grown around our inter-personal social relations where people
frequently tell lies to other persons whom they try to avoid. It is not very
surprising to mention that a person sitting at home in Delhi may respond to
other person that I have been to Shimla or Mumbai. Similarly parents who want
to inquire the well-being of their children may fake their situation by
responding in a manipulative fashion. A large part of our population who was
otherwise accessible to social exchange have become invisible by removing their
fixed phone and frequently changing their personal and public mobile numbers.
Democratic development of communication traffic is facing difficulties and more
undesired calls from advertisers of various products have become very common.
In case of fixed phones generally the privileged head of family is the
subscribed and possibility of receiving calls by any other member of a family
increases the possibility of more social interaction. However even in case of
mobile phones the teacher who wants to communicate some observations about the
students to their parents, it is difficult to easily get connected to them.
This single processor tendency to engage in made to measure individual
communication has been a strong impulse behind the success of mobile phones.
Its use has also led to a tendency of individualism and young age and teenagers
also take pride into possession of a branded mobile. At one hand, mobile phones
have extended its territory to the movement space and in the same situations
exchange of emergency situations can be executed through this. It has allowed
some amount of independence to other family members to communicate freely to
the persons of their choice. Before the advent of mobile, fixed residential
persons were forced to lose contact with persons in the movement. Thus mobile phone
has certainly extended the right to communication but how far it adds to the
well-being of its citizen’s needs to be critically evaluated.
Media
Representation and Well-being:
There are two processes of
representation, first is the system by which we relate objects and people on
the basis of mental representations that we carry in our heads, the second
system of representation is through access to a shared language so that we can
correlate our concepts with sign. The meaning is constructed by the system of
representation. It is constructed and fixed by the code, which sets up the
correlation between our conceptual system and our language system in such a way
that every time we thinks of a tree, the code tells us to use the English word
TREE or French word ARBRE. One way of thinking about ‘culture’ than is in terms
of theses shared conceptual maps, shared language systems and the codes which
govern the relationship of translation between them. These codes of culture and
language tell us to convey our ideas and concepts.
Ideas
are represented through a mimetic or visual signs and images. According
intentional approach to ideas, words mean what the author or speaker imposes
unique meaning on the world through language. According to constructionist
approach, it is social actors who use the conceptual system of their culture
and the linguistic and other representational systems to construct meaning.
According to the Father of Modern Linguistics Saussure, the production of
meaning depends on language which is a system of signs, sounds, writing and images.
Saussure also divided sign into two elements the form (the actual word image or
photo) which he called signifier and the corresponding concept that is
triggered off in your head. The signified both are requested to produce meaning
but it is the relation between them, fixed by our cultural and linguistic
codes, which sustains representation. Sign do not possesses a fixed or
essential meaning what signifies according to Saussure is not RED or essence of
redness but the difference between RED and GREEN signs. For example, it is hard
to define the meaning of father except in relation to in terms of its
difference from other kinship terms like mother, daughter, and son and so on.
This marking of difference within language is fundamental to the production of
meaning according to Saussure. The rules are the principles which we learn when
we learn a language and evaluate us to use well formed sentences called the
language (the language system). The particular acts of speaking, writing or
drawing which are produced by the speaker are called parole. Saussure model of
language is called structuralist.
Barthes
(1967) described the concept of denotation which is the simple, basic,
descriptive level, where conscious is wide and most people would agree on the
meaning (dress jeans) and connotation these signifiers which we are able to
decode at a simple level by using our conventional classification.
Interpretations
are always followed by other interpretations in an endless chain. As French
philosopher Jacqures Derrida put it, writing always leads to more writing.
Difference, he argues can never be wholly captured within any binary (Derrida,
1981). So any notation of a final meaning is always endlessly put off,
deferred. Cultural studies of this interpretive kind, like other qualitative
forms of sociological enquiry are inevitably caught up in this circle of
meaning
Foucault’s
used the word “representation” in a novel and different way. What concerned him
was the production of knowledge (rather that just meaning) through what he
called discourse (rather than language). He emphasized the historicity and
described how human beings understand themselves in our culture and has shared
meanings differ in different periods of time. Foucault focused his attention
from language to discourse. Normally, the term discourse means the passages of
connected writing but for Foucault discourse meant a group of statements and
regulated discourse in different historical periods. Things meant something and
where ‘true’ he argued, only within a specific historical context. Subjects
like madness, punishment and sexuality only exist meaningfully within the
discourse about them. Things meant something and were true he argued only
within a specific historical context. Foucault did not believe that the same
phenomena would be found across different historical periods. He thought, in
each period, discourse produced forms of knowledge, objects, subjects and
practices of knowledge, which differed radically from period to period, with no
necessary continuity between them.
Thus,
for Foucault, for example, mental illness was not an objective fact, which
remained the same in all historical periods, and meant the same thing in all
cultures. It was only within a definite discursive formation that the object,
madness, could appear at all as a meaningful or intelligible construct.
Recent
years have witnessed plethora of research in the area of self and its impact on
various mental and behavioural processes. The way people conceptualize self and
represent it often influences the behaviour and quality of life. Following
research questions are important in the context of mass-media and well-being
1) How
people use technology as a mean of self-regulation in the everyday life.
2) How
use of a particular medium of communication like T.V., internet has empowering
or misery impact on individuals and society.
3) Are
users new mode of communication has led to enhancement in the well-being.
The
mass-media in everyday life is a landscape for thought and actions that has
evolved in past few decades and a developing country like India it has taken
strong roots of inter-connectedness with the people. People nowadays are
organizing their everyday life activities with the use of mass-media. People of
different socio-economic, demographic and cultural categories are organizing
their everyday life activities such as shopping, banking, travelling, studying
and socializing to name a few. Everyday life has both kind of potential boredom
and stress at one end and authenticity, vitality and growth at the other.
According to Henri Lefebvre “Everyday life is profoundly to all activities and
encompasses them with all their differences and their conflicts, it is their
meeting place, their land, their common ground. And it is in the everyday life
that the sum total relations which make the human and every human being a whole
takes its shape and its form.’’ (1991-p97). The dynamics of our everyday
activities also result into long term indicators of self-efficacy, happiness or
complexity. The larger social, political and cultural context also influences
the micro-sociology of our living of everyday life. It is the rhythm of
everyday life expectations and its fulfilment that it helps us build
psych-efficacy or suppress it by huge gap in expectations and its fulfilment
because instrumental rationalization, commoditisation and bureaucratic power
can’t fully suppress the impulses of human desire, sociality, hope and
creativity everyday life will always harbour “the buds and shoots of new
potentialities.”(Bakhtin, 1984,p73, quoted Gardiner, p20). How this use of mass-media
blend and shape with our daily life and its impact on self efficacy and
empowerment of individuals requires a critical understanding. Critical
reflexivity is required to understand the complexity of contradiction of
emancipator as well as misery aspects of impact generated by mass-media
interaction. Mass-media has became a predominant mode of communication
including doing valuable school and
college assignments, movies and music, romantic activity, learning, performing
household chores. Emails, internet, chat sessions, social networking sites have
occupied a major share of the communication process adopted by the users of
various demographic backgrounds. How mass-media use affects the lives,
well-being, self efficacy, interpersonal communication, linguistic competence,
social identity and relationships of its users have occupied the mainstream
space in the Indian context. The American psychologist declared the mass-media
to be a “social technology that reduces social involvement and psychological
well-being”. [Kraut et.al. (1998)]. How the actual social involvement in
community activities have gone down resulting into feelings of loneliness and
alienation and in same situation mass-media use has also resulted in increased
social participation and positive social activity. Thus a kind of paradoxical
generalization goes on from the vantage point of internet users and a strong
opposition and negative generalization by those who do not advocate its use. It
is imperative to understand its functional features depending on different ways
of using would bring about widely divergent consequences. Has new medium
replaced the old medium of television can’t be answered so easily. One can find
differential use patterns among users to meet their needs and people are
interested in old and new mediums to get satisfaction for a particular type of
content. It is also presenting a generational gap among its users. Teenagers
and youth seem to have become specific user category, more frequent chatting
with representatives of the opposite gender giving them a sense of belonging to
a group in crafting their own social networks. It has also been found in recent
time that mass-media application also provides a platform to those who used the
mass-media for civic purposes tended to become more actively involved in their
community activity and while those who used the mass-media heavily but for
other purposes remained relatively disconnected from community activities. In
recent past online users organized several protests at unprecedented speed
which also brought important legislations for the prevention of crime against
women. In similar such protests electronic communications established strong
ties with the people from far-flung areas of the country for putting pressure
on the government to bring effective bill to curb corruption. Hampton and
Wellman (2003) concluded that the presence of high speed internet in the
community did not weaken or radically transform ties. Few important research
question that deserves the attention of researchers in this area include exploring
new technology role as enabler to perform our activities. People trying to
explore this new technology try to accomplish the goals that were not possible
in the preceding state of technology. How these new technologies impact the
self efficacy of an individual terms of achieving life opportunities. How these
technologies go beyond the level of individuals and lead an impact on social
and organizational realms.
A
major turn in the enquiry of such subjects is required to uncover how
individuals of different generations are making sense of and integrating its
applications into their lives. Actor’s choice of choosing a particular medium
also deserves greater attention to approach this as a process reality. This way
of viewing the process aligns interpretative research on internet in everyday
life with the social construction of technology perspective [pinch and biker,
1984, biker 1995 and law, 1992, biker, 2001] which traces the origins and
evolution of technical devices to the choices made by various group of social
actors. Many authors also talk about co-construction between users and
technologies [oudshoorn and pinch 2003]. Thus experiences of everyday life and
long term changes in larger social worlds do not remain unchanged with the
arrival of new technologies. The users of new technology have different impacts
due to its entry to a different temporal stage in the life of a person. For
example teenagers and youth of this generation organize their life worlds as
when they wake up in the morning which was not so to the previous generation of
people. The advocates of media domestication technology organized their
projects conceptually and methodologically (Haddon 2004, Berker etal 2005). How
messages in the public world produced through mass-media blend with the private
life of a person and with the moral economy of the household should be basis of
investigation.
Electronically
mediated communications encompass increasing use of abbreviations, acronyms and
emotions. Internet messaging youth and teenagers communicate large volumes of
abbreviations (e.g. ya-see you) acronyms (lol-laughing out loud) emotions
(e.g. Smiley face)
Are
children and young adults who use abbreviations and texts also employing the
same language that requires more formal style?
Language
change is often a valuable mirror on social transformation. The use of
prepositions while ending sentences, using who instead of whom is not taken as serious
deviation in grammatical sense. The distinction between affect and effect or
between its and it is being obliterated review of literature.
This
has led to a trend of using whatever attitude an indifference to the need for
consistency in linguistic usage also known as linguistic whatever’s [Baron,
2008, chapter8] human language premise of rule of governed behaviour is being
challenged. To be a native speaker of language is to know the rules [e.g. how
to form new words, how to combine words into sentences, how to pronounce
things]. Noam Chomsky’s theory of transformational grammar refers to knowledge
of such rules as “linguistic competence” [Chomsky 1965) an important research
question to ponder is that of growing sense of uncertainly what the rules are
along with attitude the decision are least important.
Another
important research question relates to the challenges of written culture with
the increasing shift to digital linguistic informality. Specific conventions of
vocabulary, grammar and notation of an author’s ownership over his or her text
are also at stake. Alphabetic writing did not develop Greece until the eight
and the seventh century BC, and it has been suggested that the alphabet enabled
Greeks to lay out their thoughts Unambi Guansly [Havelock 1963]. The motivation
to save money and time has become a prominent feature of modern life clock. Two
prominent drivers of this theory of doing everything faster are Frederic W.
Taylor and Henry Ford.
Increase
in text production and encouraging motivation connect to broader audiences and
a variety of texts available to us as readers.
But
proliferation of writing often done in haste and vast quantity of written works
at our fingertips has also led to “flooding the scriptorium”.
Does
the abundance of good thing relate to our proficiency building?
If
e-mail more or less entirely replaced the old fashioned letter, the culture as
a whole will end up with a deficit, it will have lost in quality whatever it
has gained in quantity (Eriksen, 2001 p59)
Educational
establishments and educationists are at a loss with the altitudinal shift in
the current generation of students who want to learn everything online from
visual imagery, collaboratively rather than individually limited to chapters
rather than entire book. Any assignment for which online references are not
available on google search it is difficult to organize debate on such topics.
Students are missing the context by which meanings to the online texts have
been provided. Writers of all ilk from students teachers often simply revise
the same document file as they work on a manuscript leaving no trace of earlier
drafts. The early drafts of manuscripts by novelists poets or short story to
trace their literary journey is often irretrievable.
Mass-media
also help members of developing countries accelerate the pace of development
and an opportunity to improve growth prospects. Some of key issues upon which
the mass-media supported social movements are based include “democracy, popular
sovereignty, control over natural resources, human rights and the environment
(Johnson & Laxer 2003 p62). The mass-media has been seen as a tool that
“facilitates civil society activities by offering new possibilities for citizen
participation” (yang, 2003, p406).
Narratives
on mass-media and economic development are divided into two categories of
optimists and pessimists.
Online
health information has brought revolutionary changes in positive health care.
It is not only information about health care but it also becomes a tool for
patients and recovery processes.
In
understanding what Gidden’s (1991) called the “project of self” children and
young people are experiencing internet as a valued new place for social
exploration and self expressions (Hollway and Valentine 2003). Young people
innovate, interact, integrate and engage with each other through mediated
communication.
It
is an undeniable fact of recent age that in one way or another everyone is
affected by the ubiquity of new online technologies and it has resulted into the
blurring of distinctive social practices of information, entertainment, work
and leisure, public and private, even childhood and adulthood. There are issues
related to safety and security of childhood especially peers networking that
has drawn academics and policy attention.
It
is utopian to talk of present age without use of mass-media.
It
would be pertinent to examine legitimate and resourceful use of mass-media for
communicating, learning, participating, playing, connecting and so on.
Based on review of
literature present study is planned to examine following research questions:
Present
research would aim to explore use pattern of three generations of people of the
mass-media.
It
will also examine the differences in terms of generation by use of mass-media
interaction schedule to be prepared by the researcher.
It
will also attempt to examine regional variations of people living in cities and
villages.
This
study will also examine gender difference in the use of mass-media.
Present
study would aim to explore the relationship of internet and psycho-social
capital.
CHAPTER – 2
OBJECTIVES
AND
METHODOLOGY
OBJECTIVES:
Following were the objectives of this project:
1. Empowering
the student participant learn skills of appreciating social reality with a
research and critical orientation.
2. Understanding
the way media is created and modalities of its functioning.
3. Exploring
the patterns of use and exposures to mass-media in urban families from
different social backgrounds and examining its relationship with psychosocial
well-being.
4. Understanding
the media map impact on our psycho-social well-being.
5. How
people use technology as a mean of self-regulation in the everyday life.
6. How
use of a particular medium of communication like T.V., internet has empowering
or misery impact on individuals and society.
7. Are
users new mode of communication has led to enhancement in the well-being.
8. Language
being an important component of self expression has empowering or limiting
impact on the individual.
9. Is
mass-media becoming an empowering mechanism, moving the lives of ordinary
people better or is it leading to a divide across generations, gender and
background.
METHODOLOGY:
To address the above mentioned
objectives, the study will involve multi-pranged strategy. The goal of this
study is to see the pattern of self-regulation through mass-media mediated life
routine (N=240) of different generations of people. The study consists of four phases i.e. (1) preparation, (2) pilot
study, (3) main study, and (4) report writing. In the course of study the
participating faculty and students acted as co-researchers and learners. They
jointly co-constructed the understanding of media influences. In order to
supplement the quantitative aspects of data the students have tried to develop
a map of subjective domains of feelings, perceptions and imaginations of the
participating families so that a comprehensive picture of reality may emerge.
The study also involved qualitative as well as quantitative methodological
approaches to tap the processes and outcomes, which are mentioned below in this
chapter.
The students got firsthand
experience of planning and undertaking research process and appreciating
reality as a critical investigator and inculcate in them necessary social
sensitivity, research skills and problem solving orientation. The students were
encouraged to master interviewing, observation, data analysis and report
writing. They were also encouraged to develop interest in academic and applied
problem solving and to get a feel of accomplishment. The students through this
research, tried to understand how media is produced as well as consumed. To understand the production of media the
students were exposed to media centres and interact with media people. The
consumption of media was examined by interacting with families representing
high, middle and low social class backgrounds would be drawn from Delhi metro
area with 40 families from each setting with a total of 120. Within each
category nuclear and joint/extended families will be included. The relevant
data would be collected with the help of observation, interview, and self
report measures of life goals, aspirations, value orientation, subjective
well-being, social well-being, academic orientation, and health status.
As mentioned above, for this
purpose, suitable quantitative and qualitative analysis approaches were
employed by the investigating team which are as follows:-
Case study –
The plan is to have in depth case studies of 240
participants to get an account of lived reality of mass-media interaction.
Coverage –
·
The study will be
conducted on adolescents, Young adults and senior adults. We also plan to have
50% of the participants of the opposite gender.
·
Mass-Media interaction
questionnaire to be developed by researcher.
·
This questionnaire will
be applied to all the participants to capture the impact of mass-media.
Exhaustive
analysis was done to achieve the objectives in following steps:
a) Preparation
b) Pilot
Study
c) Main
Study
d) Report
Writing
a)
Preparation
i. Interaction
with media experts
ii. Interaction
with the mentor
iii. Literature
Review
iv. Visits
to media organization
v. Visits
to families
vi. Development
of Interview Schedule
b)
Pilot
Study
Student Researchers visited families in groups and
on the basis of 20 samples out of total 240 samples of the final study items
were revised, discussed and finalised.
c)
Main
Study
·
Sample size – 240
(persons Male & Female), viz. per student – 24,
·
Strategy used –
quantitative and qualitative method.
·
Data collection using
social well-being questionnaire was completed of 120 families 240 persons.
·
Media – map
questionnaire was used among them.
·
Qualitative observation
report of each family was gathered from students own experience report of their
understanding of the topic.
d)
Report
Writing
The findings
analysed indicated the following:-
i.
It appears that the
media is an indispensable part of our lives.
ii.
It is becoming a site
for protecting and consuming desires as well as dreaming a world which at times
becomes an illusion that interferes with the real world.
iii.
There is need for
creating awareness in families to understand the advantages and disadvantages
of media.
iv.
The younger generation
is now getting habituated to organize their life through the inputs from media.
v.
The family and
community life is getting disorganized due to time pressure generated by media
experience.
vi.
Media also emerged to
be a powerful source of information, knowledge, skill building and cultural
sensitivity.
vii.
The study also tends to
suggest as the fourth pillar of democracy media is capable of generating pressure
for social and public-policy decisions.
viii.
Media market tactics
also need to be understood.
CHAPTER – 3
RESULTS
After
analysing the above data of the research study, the researcher arrived at the
following findings:-
i.
It appears that the
media is an indispensable part of our lives.
ii.
It is becoming a site
for protecting and consuming desires as well as dreaming a world which at times
becomes an illusion that interferes with the real world.
iii.
There is need for
creating awareness in families to understand the advantages and disadvantages
of media.
iv.
The younger generation
is now getting habituated to organize their life through the inputs from media.
v.
The family and
community life is getting disorganized due to time pressure generated by media
experience.
vi.
Media also emerged to
be a powerful source of information, knowledge, skill building and cultural
sensitivity.
vii.
The study also tends to
suggest as the fourth pillar of democracy that media is capable of generating
pressure for social and public-policy decisions.
viii. Media
market tactics also need to be understood.
RESULTS
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Age (Year)
|
Adolescent (12-20)
|
51
|
21.3
|
Adult (21-40)
|
107
|
44.6
|
|
Middle Age (41-60)
|
79
|
32.9
|
|
Old Age (61 & above)
|
3
|
1.3
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Gender
|
Male
|
115
|
47.9
|
Female
|
125
|
52.1
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Education
|
Illiterate
|
22
|
9.2
|
(1-8)th
|
29
|
12.1
|
|
(9-12)th
|
47
|
19.6
|
|
U.G
|
99
|
41.3
|
|
P.G
|
43
|
17.9
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Marital Status
|
Married
|
147
|
61.3
|
Unmarried
|
93
|
38.7
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Religion
|
Hindu
|
218
|
90.8
|
Muslim
|
10
|
4.2
|
|
Sikh
|
4
|
1.7
|
|
Others
|
8
|
3.3
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Family type
|
Nuclear
|
178
|
74.2
|
Joint
|
62
|
25.8
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Occupation
|
Govt. Job
|
36
|
15.0
|
Private Job
|
22
|
9.2
|
|
Self employed
|
57
|
23.8
|
|
Unemployed
|
125
|
52.0
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Socioeconomic
status
|
Higher
|
82
|
34.2
|
Middle
|
80
|
33.3
|
|
Lower
|
76
|
32.5
|
|
Table-1 shows the descriptive statistics of socio-demographic variables
Variables
|
Frequency
|
Percentage
|
|
Domicile
|
Urban
|
207
|
86.2
|
Rural
|
33
|
13.8
|
|
CHAPTER – 4
DISCUSSION
AND
CONCLUSION
DISCUSSION:
In present
era of globalization, majority of people in the society depends on information
and communication to remain connected with the world and do our daily
activities like work, entertainment, health care, education, socialization,
travelling and anything else that we have to do. A common urban person usually
wakes up in the morning checks the TV news or newspaper, goes to work, makes a
few phone calls, eats with their family or peers when possible and makes his
decisions based on the information that he has either from their co workers, TV
news, friends, family, financial reports, etc. we need to be conscious of the
reality that most of our decisions, beliefs and values are based on what we
know for a fact, our assumptions and our own experience. In our work we usually
know what we have to do, base on our experience and studies, however on our
routine life and house hold chores we mostly rely on the mass media to get the
current news and facts about what is important and what we should be aware of.
There has been and
increasing level of concern about the influences of mass communication process.
We have put our trust on the media as an
authority to give us news, entertainment and education. However, the influence
of mass media on our kids, teenagers and society is so big that we should know
how it really works.
This project addressed the influence of media
on the different aspects of life. It recognizes the changes in the life world
emanating from media. They are reorganizing life experiences in terms of time,
space, and efficiency. These interventions are resulting in significant changes
in mental habits, pattern of time use, quality and nature of social
interaction, and well-being. At individual level people are feeling empowered.
By amplifying human capacity, enhancing performance, and facilitating various
goals these technologies are shaping the motives, emotions, and choices in
significant ways. Indeed they are deeply entrenched in today’s lives in urban
India. However, the consequences are, however, not free from problems. They are
interfering with many activities in the life world and their fruitful
integration with personal, family, and organizational domains often become
problematic. The project envisages engaging with these issues to attain three
related goals i.e. (1) helping the student participants learn the skills of
appreciating social reality, (2) understanding the way media is created and the
modalities of its functioning, (3) exploring the pattern of use and exposure to
mass media (TV) in urban families from different social class backgrounds and
examining its relationship with psycho-social well-being.
The
project team of students along with teachers, mentor and other experts
developed a questionnaire on psycho-social well-being to be used in data
collection. Also standardized questionnaire was used to map the presence of
media processes in our day - to - day life. In order to supplement the
quantitative aspects of data the students have tried to develop a map of
subjective domains of feelings, perceptions and imaginations of the
participating families so that a comprehensive picture of reality may emerge.
The
students attended several lectures on qualitative and quantitative research
techniques to equip themselves to gather data for the research more
scientifically.
In literature it was also found that:
l Light mass-media attendance
has a relaxing effect which can contribute to an increased life satisfaction.
l Television can increase the
time that family members spend together, thus increasing quality of family
life.
l Mass-media attendance has a
negative correlation with life satisfaction (heavy TV viewers are more
unsatisfied).
l The effect is heavier in an
elderly sample.
l TV viewing induces
materialist attitudes. People do social comparisons with average other
(projection extracted from TV images - see cultivation hypothesis), thus the
perceived of their own quality of life is lower.
The media, print and electronic, have done a lot to
make life tolerable, to keep hope alive, and to sustain human spirit in the
face of monumental problems our society has faced over the decades. A
reasonable level of prosperity, human dignity, realistic opportunities for
vertical mobility and confidence in the fairness and justice of our political
and social institutions are well within reach of all of us. The media have a
pivotal role in this gigantic, exhilarating and eventually rewarding task. The
anticipation and excitement with which we wait for the morning newspapers and
the pleasure with which we tune in our favorite channel are testimonies to this
great potential of the media in our society. There is every reason to hope, and
believe that our media will play an even more glorious role in fulfilling our
potential as a nation, and promoting human happiness.
Therefore, after analyzing
the results, it can be easily interpreted that Mass communication is clearly in
the middle of a massive transition, which only time will tell. Each innovation
adds something on the one hand and subtracts something on the other. In any
event, all such innovations have unforeseeable effects. A final point on which
there can be little doubt is that the media, whether moulders or reflectors of
change, are undoubtedly messengers about change, or seen as such by their
producers and their audiences, and it is around this observation that the main
perspectives on mass media can best be organized.
In
the research study, it was found that media production and consumption by the
society at large has a strong linkage with the socio-cultural context and
values endorsed by the people and their well-being at large.
It
has been observed that teenagers and youth are most dominant sections of the
society indulging in media usage. They have also discovered gender differences
among the use of media gadgets. The dependence of people for navigating their
day to day and academic activities is very strong with the media processes.
The mass media started evolving due to need of humans
to communicate and express its views and thoughts in front of others. Now the
MEDIA in real sense is reaching to MASSES and giving knowledge.
The
use of mass-media in education particularly in higher education where majority
part of our population is of 20 to 35 is going to be a potential area of
exploration. Mass-media processes can be of immense academic use through Skype
or satellite education catering to the needs of our rural students through
distance learning programmes. The initiative to explore various domains has led
to discovery of new facets of life which the students and teachers have
realized. Some of the findings at initial level also indicate several life
style changes due to media impact particularly the commercial media.
As indicated
earlier the project was meant for building competence in the students as well
as understanding media and its impact on families. It is gratifying that the
students took the task seriously and showed enhanced sensibility for social
processes. After this research, it has become clear that the media is produced
under diverse conditions and different motives are at work. The limited
interaction on families suggested that gender and age are predominant
demographic factors influencing the pattern of media use. The preferences for
programs and their use appear to be linked with these factors. Also, people
develop certain attitudes toward media as far as their dependability and
significance is concerned.
Although
it is not conclusive that media dependence has led to empowerment or has been
just an information gathering process. Lots
of positive media usage areas which do not constitute a part of our daily life
practices have emerged during our explorations . For instance the use of media
in medicine, remote-sensing if properly explored can bring wonders to the
well-being of people.
CONCLUSION:
We
are now in position to draw conclusions on the basis of the findings or the
results listed in the previous section. In the present section, therefore an
attempt has been made to discuss and interpret the findings to arrive at
certain conclusions. On the basis of the findings of the study, following
conclusion has been drawn.
Mass-media
influence on behavior of people has acquired large share as compared to other
mediums. Mass Media messages are conveyed through Television, Computer, Mobile
phone, Film, Newspapers, radio and social networking sites to a large number of
populations. Exposure, Access or attention to media messages are important of source of shaping attitude,
interest, emotional and cultural expression in more determining ways than our
previous times. Mass - Media message impact has shown that audience responses
to media content of pleasure, pain, anger, violence is not the same across the
population. That means media messages are polysemic that each media message or
text is capable of being interpreted in a variety of ways. Media not only
represents social reality it creates its own social reality. Media propagated
reality acquires a dominant part but it is not monopolistic. Detailed analysis
and critical analysis is ignored at the cost of media prioritizing agenda and
cultivation of life styles close to fictional reality rather than factual.
Media messages try to dramatize events with a mix of narrative, public appeal,
popular taste, and mass consumption and so on. Decoding dynamics of media
messages produced and received reveal a variable pattern of effect on the basis
of direct experience. Mass-media has led to powerful impact on the young
generation in terms of shaping the expectations, desires and emotions due to
their excess use and dependence on mass media. Life styles are chosen primarily
by selecting those on offer through media. Continuous flow of information has
also led to a stage of conditioning of our minds to rely on media information
for finding solutions to our problems. Media also serves use and gratification
purpose by providing escape from the normal routine, surrogate member of a
community like face-book, help us confirm our sense of identity, satisfying a
feeling of surveillance- feeling of what is going on.
One
important reason why people engage in media messages is intertextuality that is
they may read one text in relation to others. There have been significant
differences in media use pattern on the dimensions of age, gender and economic
status. It would be erroneous to assume mass media users as an undifferentiated
mass. Social location, literacy and media awareness, gender and age adopt
different source of discursive resources for decoding media messages. It is
prudent not to make generalization about media audience about their patterns of
receptivity. Even in the same house hold variable pattern of media interaction
can be found. Mass media tends to
produce homogenization of products,
services, life-style, art and culture providing numerous guidance implicit and
explicit and tries to foster new
identities to its viewers when people are
engulfed by information to such extent that
distinction between reality and
hyper reality is blurred.
Life
styles are chosen primarily by selecting those on offer through media.
Traditional systems are facing threat of extinction owing to large influx of
new information. Mere research survey of manifest opinions of people will not
be close to the reality of media people interaction outcome .The nature of
representation in the media of women, youth and children also reflects a
particular display of certain attribute like intimacy and emotion, custodians
of future. It was discovered through this project that members of marginalized
communities’ representation is strongly skewed. The representations of
marginalized groups are done mostly for token roles. Rising rate of juvenile
crimes can be attributed to amplification spiral. Social circumstances are
excluded in the reporting of juvenile crimes leading to a stage of moral panic.
Deviant minority of paedophiles or stranger danger is accorded undue attention
than it deserves and other actual and serious issues of road accidents,
malnutrition, epidemic and other such problems are not accorded due importance which constitutes vast
majority of child deaths. Concepts of deviancy and morality are used rather
simplistically, with little concern for the context of social inequalities in
which they operate. In the prime time shows old and marginal are excluded.
Double standards of ageing are reflected by media in which women are required
to match the youthful ideal all their lives but men are not. Disabled persons
are represented as loss of one’s humanity, as an emblem of social evil, as an
object of fun or pity, stereotypical portrayal of image. The representation of
disabled is portrayal not as a person or an individual but on the basis of
classification. One strong area that emerged through mass media research is the
depiction of sexuality in media. Mass - media depicts sexual behaviors on the
screen which is very harmful to adolescents and youths who are susceptible to
media influence as they are blank sheets on which mass media can script its
story well. Inaccurate image of sex leads to unrealistic expectations,
frustrations and dissatisfaction among adolescents and youth. Such expectations
of fantasy and frustration can be minimized with help of effective media
literacy. Mass media as a credible medium is also received with great
skepticism due to twisted representation and attaching more importance to the
fictional aspects and conjectural realms. However many good things like myths
around gender and work class supremacy
corruption in high places sporting talent in the rural areas have come
to the fore due to exposure by the media. The context of television viewing has
changed over time all the family together watching television but internet and
mobile phones still operate within parameters of home within home.
There
are also differential patterns of programmes choice youth hard tough, old age
spiritual and religious, women soft and fictional with many exceptions in each
category. Children’s in particular have been found to be vulnerable to
hypodermic effects of media messages. But this assumption can’t be generalized
and children even at the age of 8to 10 reported well developed media literacy.
People appearing in advertisements were described as ugly, stupid, and some of
the children were particularly cynical about free gifts. Some children also
reported strong disenchantment of particular news stories being repeated for
long periods. Mass media deal in symbols and their representations lead to
construction of dreams, desires and expectations but fail prescribe the roadmap
to achieve those expectations in real life situation in equitable fashion. The
overall psychosocial wellbeing can improve with impetus on educational role of
mass media. Vast majority of our agricultural population can improve their
yield with help of spread of scientific methods in the farming. Current
predominance of co modification and profit motive a major objective of welfare
is being largely ignored. Government controlled mass media organizations are
engaged in developmental initiatives but it lacks popularity among the common
mass due to less effective propaganda strategy adopted by them. We also need
good government initiative have mass media research institutions. Even our
syllabi content should provide adequate attention to mass media from primary to
higher education level. There is a trend of flash mob that have emerged
recently but they aggregate for a cause for momentary period and vanish and
their agenda is also vanished.
In
Indian context several protests have been organized through the help of
networking sites and some of them resulted in decision making at the government
level. But grassroot change at the level of internalizing those conducts in the
lives of people has not happened as increase in crime against women has been
reported by the media. Similarly altruistic behavior pattern in the community
life of individualistic urban context has been witnessing a moral nadir. If
more researches are conducted awakening the awareness of youth and adolescents
psychosocial wellbeing can improve at individual and community level. Even
concept of wellbeing has acquired business model in which major implicit
objective is profit earning and welfare is just the part of advertisement
slogan. Hospitals and hospitality sector have also fallen prey to this business
model of earning more and more profit and it is very often reported that big
names seek tax exemption benefits for serving the poor and destitute but they
rarely follow such policy. Simply putting the blame game on an individual or an
institution will not solve the challenging task of achieving wellbeing at
holistic levels. We require more such researches to find effective solutions
for the psychosocial wellbeing. Participation of young researchers reduces the
general bias of being expert and brings quality dimension to the quest for
exploring reality.
CHAPTER – 5
REFERENCES
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