Running head: MEDIAS INFLUENCE ON JUVENILES

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Medias Influence on Juveniles

Nicole McCurry
Lenoir-Rhyne University
4/26/2015

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For adolescents in todays society, social media is basically their whole life. It is
all they have ever known so of course it is a big priority. Social media can be a positive
thing or it can be very negative. For a majority of adolescents it can be negative. It is time
consuming, it is distracting, and it can be hurtful. But it is also a way to keep in touch
with long distance relatives and helps them find a social support group. Parents need to
be vigilant in what their kids are watching and seeing on social media because it could
explain a quite a few of their behaviors. Social Learning Theory and Cultivation Theory
can help to explain why adolescents tend to model what they constantly see.
According to the Social Learning theory, people will be more likely to imitate
behaviors they see frequently performed by models that are rewarded or at least not
punished (Arnett 2013). Because American adolescents are spending most of their day on
some sort of social media, this is affecting their way of thinking. They are seeing all of
these cues on what to do, what to wear, what to listen to, to the point that they feel that
they have no choice but to follow those cues. American adolescents listen to music for
about 4 hours a day and watch television for another 2 hours. All together, American
adolescents typically spend about 7 hours per day using media (Arnett 2013). Cultivation
theory states that watching television gradually shapes or cultivates a persons
worldview, so that over time it comes to resemble the worldview most frequently
depicted on TV (Arnett 2013). For example, adolescent girls who are frequent viewers of
soap operas have been found to be more likely than other girls to believe that single
mothers have relatively easy lives because this is how single mothers are often depicted
on soap operas (Arnett 2013).

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One recent study found that individuals high in narcissism and low in self-esteem
were related to greater online activity as well as some self-promotional content
(Mehdizadeh 2010). It also found that males put more in the About Me section of
Facebook, while females are more likely to showcase themselves in the Main Photos
section. Social media can make it seem that other people have their lives perfectly put
together, even if it may not be true, which in turn could make your own self esteem
decrease. A recent study showed that people have a natural inclination to perceive their
peers as being happier than they are which is exacerbated by sites like MySpace,
Facebook and Twitter, as they give users the ability to create a cyber-representation of
their own life (Mehdizadeh 2010). Studies have shown that for adolescents who have
social media have lower GPAs than adolescents that do not. And also, adolescents who
use social media tend to score 20% lower on tests than their counterparts. Social media
can get in the way of being productive at school and when doing homework. It can cause
adolescents to procrastinate by constantly checking their social media sites. Things
spread like wildfire on social media, and this includes things that may not be true. On
Facebook, articles get shared constantly that claim they are news sites, but it is really
spam websites that can give your computer a virus. So for adolescents, seeing all that
misinformation can skew their thinking into wrongful thinking. Humans need face-toface interactions, especially adolescents. When adolescents are constantly communicating
on social media rather than in person, they are missing out on that face-to-face interaction
that they need (Jordan 2010).
There are also some positive aspects of Social media. Sites, like Facebook, have
support groups that adolescents can join to better themselves. Members of these groups

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can discuss their health conditions and share important information and resources
relevant to their conditions while creating strong support networks. Social media sites
allow adolescents to connect and communicate easily with family members or friends
that may live a long distance away that they may not see on a regular basis. Adolescents
who have social media can use it to talk with their peers and get help with their
homework or work together on group projects. They can also go on social media sites
that are more like blogs to get help on their homework if their friends were unable to
help. The Millennials Report Blogs provides middle and high school students frequently
changing topics for discussion. The users are expected to read provided background
information about the topic before expressing their views on the blog (Strom 2012).
Sometimes, it seems that because of social media and all media in general; adolescents
are more articulate and sophisticated. They are often comfortable talking to a wide range
of people and about a wide range of topics, and even those who never travel often know
more about the larger world than do many of the adults in their lives (Barth 2015).
For certain impressionable adolescents, violent media can play a role in
aggression and delinquency. There are the video games, movies, and television shows
that obviously show crime and aggression. And then there are media outlets that are
subtler about violence, for instance, the action movies where the protagonist kills the
villain and is praised for it. This subtly reinforces for young people that killing is okay.
With the cultivation theory, the more those adolescents see this type of behavior, even as
subtle as it is, they will start to feel like it is okay to be aggressive and violent with
people. Meta analysis of the unhealthy effects of media-violence have shown that youth
who view media-violence on a regular basis are more likely to exhibit antisocial

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behavior, ranging from imitative violent behavior with toys to criminal violence,
acceptance of violent behavior, increased feelings of hostility, and desensitization toward
violent behavior (Cantor 2000). Desensitization is another well-documented effect of
viewing violence, which is observable in reduced arousal and emotional disturbance
while witnessing violence, the reduced tendency to intervene in a fight, and less
sympathy for the victims of violence (Cantor 2000).
Since the use of social media has increased, so has cyber bullying. It used to be
that if you were getting bullied, it was someone bigger and older than you, physically
harming you. Now it could be virtually anybody behind a computer screen trying to
attack you with words. With todays privacy capabilities, people can hide behind fake
names and fake pictures to try and hurt you. There is a whole show about this called
Catfish on MTV where people have fake names and start relationships with people and
then they get caught. These people are usually self-conscious themselves and want to
make other people feel just as self-conscious themselves as they do. And really, they
dont even have to have a fake name; they could just be completely anonymous.
Social media is very prevalent in adolescents life. Because they spend so much
time on it, it affects the way they act, what they like, what they do, etc. This does not
include every adolescent; there are some that are more impressionable than others so they
are more susceptible to the negative effects of the medias influence. Continued, constant
exposure is also what really makes a difference in the susceptibility of negative effects of
media. Parents do not need to be constantly watching over their adolescents shoulder
trying to figure out what they are doing because that will make the adolescent feel like

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they are not trusted. Spending time and just talking with your kids about what they are
doing will help them to open up to you. Limiting their time spent on social media to help
reduce the exposure of the negative influences will certainly help. Parents can offer
alternatives to how they spend their time by setting up more family time entertainment
and activities. Because of becoming desensitized by the media, adolescents may not
realize that what they are looking at is actually affecting them in negative ways.

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Bibliography
Arnett, J. J. (2013). Media. In Adolescence and emerging adulthood: A cultural approach
(pp. 336-361). Boston: Pearson.
Barth, F. (2015). Social Media and Adolescent Development: Hazards, Pitfalls and
Opportunities for Growth. Clinical Social Work Journal, 43(2), 201-208.
doi:10.1007/s10615-014-0501-6
Cantor, J. (2000). Media violence. Journal of Adolescent Health. 27(2). Supp. 1. 30-34.
Ferguson, C., Muoz, M., Garza, A., & Galindo, M. (2014). Concurrent and Prospective
Analyses of Peer, Television and Social Media Influences on Body
Dissatisfaction, Eating Disorder Symptoms and Life Satisfaction in Adolescent
Girls. Journal Of Youth & Adolescence, 43(1), 1-14. doi:10.1007/s109640129898-9
Jordan A, Monin B, Dweck C, Lovett B, John O, Gross J (2010), Misery Has More
Company Than People Think: Underestimating the Prevalence , Sage
Mehdizadeh, S. (2010). Self-Presentation 2.0: Narcissism and Self-Esteem on Facebook.
Cyberpsychology, Behavior & Social Networking, 13(4), 357-364.
doi:10.1089/cyber.2009.0257
Strom, P., & Strom, R. (2012). Growing Up with Social Networks and Online
Communities. Education Digest, 78(1), 48-51.