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Mean World Syndrome
Mean world syndrome is a hypothesized cognitive bias wherein people may perceive the world to be more dangerous than it actually is, due to long-term moderate to heavy exposure to violence-related content on mass media. Proponents of the syndrome—which was coined by communications professor George Gerbner in the 1970s—assert that viewers who are exposed to violence-related content can experience increased fear, anxiety, pessimism and heightened state of alert in response to perceived threats. This is because media (namely television) consumed by viewers has the power to directly influence and inform their attitudes, beliefs and opinions about the world. History The term ''mean world syndrome'' was coined in the late-1960s by U.S. communications professor George Gerbner, whose life's work explored the effects of television on viewers. Cultural Indicators Project and cultivation theory In 1968, Gerbner established the Cultural Indicators Project (CIP), which was a pioneering a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Homicide In The United States
Homicide occurs when a person kills another person. A homicide requires only a volitional act or omission that causes the death of another, and thus a homicide may result from accidental, reckless, or negligent acts even if there is no intent to cause harm. Homicides can be divided into many overlapping legal categories, such as murder, manslaughter, justifiable homicide, assassination, killing in war (either following the laws of war or as a war crime), euthanasia, and capital punishment, depending on the circumstances of the death. These different types of homicides are often treated very differently in human societies; some are considered crimes, while others are permitted or even ordered by the legal system. Criminality Criminal homicide takes many forms including accidental killing or murder. Criminal homicide is divided into two broad categories, murder and manslaughter, based upon the state of mind and intent of the person who commits the homicide. A report issued ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Media Education Foundation
The Media Education Foundation is a nonprofit organization established in 1992 that produces and distributes documentary films about the impact of American mass media. Their films focus on topics such as gender, race and representation, health, class, consumerism, politics, and the environment, with the purpose of encouraging critical thought about the media, its effects on viewers, and on the world more broadly. Sut Jhally founded the Media Education Foundation after receiving a cease and desist letter from MTV, whose music video clips he had compiled to create a video for use as a teaching tool about sexism and the objectification of women in popular culture. He countered that the work was protected under the fair use doctrine and that his intent was to use the clip for educational purposes only. Jhally subsequently founded the Media Education Foundation as a platform for distributing other films regarding media awareness and its impact. Films include Dreamworlds (2007), War Made ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Missing White Woman Syndrome
Missing white woman syndrome is a term which is used by social scientists and media commentators in reference to the media coverage, especially on television, of missing-person cases involving young, attractive, white, upper middle class women or girls compared to the relative lack of attention towards missing women who were not white, of lower social classes, or of missing men or boys. Although the term was coined in the context of missing-person cases, it is sometimes used of coverage of other violent crimes. The phenomenon has been highlighted in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and other predominantly white countries. American news anchor Gwen Ifill is widely considered the originator of the phrase. Charlton McIlwain defined the syndrome as "white women occupying a privileged role as violent crime victims in news media reporting", and posited that missing white woman syndrome functions as a type of racial hierarchy in the cu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Just-world Hypothesis
The just-world hypothesis or just-world fallacy is the cognitive bias that assumes that "people get what they deserve" – that actions will have morally fair and fitting consequences for the actor. For example, the assumptions that noble actions will eventually be rewarded and evil actions will eventually be punished fall under this hypothesis. In other words, the just-world hypothesis is the tendency to attribute consequences to—or expect consequences as the result of— either a universal force that restores moral balance or a universal connection between the nature of actions and their results. This belief generally implies the existence of cosmic justice, destiny, divine providence, desert, stability, and/or order. It is often associated with a variety of fundamental fallacies, especially in regard to rationalizing suffering on the grounds that the sufferers "deserve" it. The hypothesis popularly appears in the English language in various figures of speech that imply guaran ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
For The Children (politics)
"Think of the children" (also "What about the children?") is a cliché that evolved into a rhetorical tactic. In the literal sense, it refers to children's rights (as in discussions of child labor). In debate, however, it is a plea for pity that is used as an appeal to emotion, and therefore it may become a logical fallacy. ''Art, Argument, and Advocacy'' (2002) argued that the appeal substitutes emotion for reason in debate. Ethicist Jack Marshall wrote in 2005 that the phrase's popularity stems from its capacity to stunt rationality, particularly discourse on morals. "Think of the children" has been invoked by censorship proponents to shield children from perceived danger. ''Community, Space and Online Censorship'' (2009) argued that classifying children in an infantile manner, as innocents in need of protection, is a form of obsession over the concept of purity. A 2011 article in the ''Journal for Cultural Research'' observed that the phrase grew out of a moral panic. I ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fear, Uncertainty And Doubt
Fear, uncertainty and doubt (often shortened to FUD) is a propaganda tactic used in sales, marketing, public relations, politics, polling and cults. FUD is generally a strategy to influence perception by disseminating negative and dubious or false information and a manifestation of the appeal to fear. Definition The term "fear, uncertainty and doubt" appeared as far back as the 1920s, whereas the similar formulation "doubts, fears and uncertainties" reaches back to 1693. By 1975, the term was appearing abbreviated as FUD in marketing and sales contexts as well as in public relations: The abbreviation FUD is also alternatively rendered as "fear, uncertainty and disinformation". FUD was first used with its common current technology-related meaning by Gene Amdahl in 1975, after he left IBM to found his own company, Amdahl Corp.: This usage of FUD to describe disinformation in the computer hardware industry is said to have led to subsequent popularization of the term. As E ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fascination With Death
Fascination with death has occurred throughout human history, characterized by obsessions with death and all things related to death and the afterlife. In past times, and present, people would form cults around death and figures. Famously, Anubis, Osiris, Hades, and La Santa Muerte have all had large cult followings. La Santa Muerte (Saint Death), or the personification of death, is currently worshiped by many in Mexico and other countries in Central America. Day of the Dead (2 November) is a celebration for the dead. History The ancient Egyptians are most famous for their fascination of death by mummifying their dead and building exquisite tombs, like the pyramids of Giza, for their dead. Many of their deities were death-related, such as: Ammut, the devourer of unworthy souls; Anubis, the guardian of the Necropolis and the keeper of poisons, medicines, and herbs; and Osiris, the king of the dead. The Greek underworld, Hades, was ruled by the god Hades, and had five rive ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Doomscrolling
Doomscrolling or doomsurfing is the act of spending an excessive amount of time reading large quantities of negative news online. A 2019 NAS study found that doomscrolling can be linked to a decline in mental and physical health. History Origins The practice of doomscrolling can be compared to an older phenomenon from the 1970s called the mean world syndrome, described as "the belief that the world is a more dangerous place to live in than it actually is as a result of long-term exposure to violence-related content on television". Studies show that seeing upsetting news leads people to seek out more information on the topic, creating a self-perpetuating cycle. In common parlance, the word "doom" connotes darkness and evil, referring to one's fate (cf. damnation). In the early online days, "surfing" was a common verb used in reference to browsing the internet; similarly, the word "scrolling" refers to sliding through online text, images, etc. Though the word "doomscrolling" is not ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deviancy Amplification Spiral
The deviancy amplification spiral and deviancy amplification are terms used by interactionist sociologist to refer to the way levels of deviance or crime can be increased by the societal reaction to deviance itself. Origin of term The process of deviancy amplification was first described by Leslie T. Wilkins. Process According to sociologist Stanley Cohen, the spiral starts with some deviant act. Usually the deviance is criminal, but it can also involve lawful acts considered morally repugnant by a large segment of society. With the new focus on the issue, hidden or borderline examples that would not themselves have been newsworthy are reported, confirming the pattern. This confirmation of the pattern was first documented by Stanley Cohen in ''Folk Devils and Moral Panic,'' a study of the media response to clashes between the Mods and Rockers, two rival subcultures of the time. Reported cases of such deviance are often presented as the ones we know about, or the "tip of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cognitive Bias
A cognitive bias is a systematic pattern of deviation from norm or rationality in judgment. Individuals create their own "subjective reality" from their perception of the input. An individual's construction of reality, not the objective input, may dictate their behavior in the world. Thus, cognitive biases may sometimes lead to perceptual distortion, inaccurate judgment, illogical interpretation, or what is broadly called irrationality. Although it may seem like such misperceptions would be aberrations, biases can help humans find commonalities and shortcuts to assist in the navigation of common situations in life. Some cognitive biases are presumably adaptive. Cognitive biases may lead to more effective actions in a given context. Furthermore, allowing cognitive biases enables faster decisions which can be desirable when timeliness is more valuable than accuracy, as illustrated in heuristics. Other cognitive biases are a "by-product" of human processing limitations, resulting ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Culture Of Fear
Culture of fear (or climate of fear) is the concept that people may incite fear in the general public to achieve political or workplace goals through emotional bias; it was developed as a sociological framework by Frank Furedi and has been more recently popularized by the American sociologist Barry Glassner. In politics Nazi leader Hermann Göring explains how people can be made fearful and to support a war they otherwise would oppose: In her book ''State and Opposition in Military Brazil'', Maria Helena Moreira Alves found a "culture of fear" was implemented as part of political repression since 1964. She used the term to describe methods implemented by the national security apparatus of Brazil in its effort to equate political participation with risk of arrest and torture. Cassação (English: cassation) is one such mechanism used to punish members of the military by legally declaring them dead. This enhanced the potential for political control through intensifying the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cultivation Theory
Cultivation theory is a sociological and communications framework to examine the lasting effects of media, primarily television. It suggests that people who are regularly exposed to media for long periods of time are more likely to perceive the world's social realities as they are presented by the media they consume, which in turn affects their attitudes and behaviors. Cultivation theory was first created by professor George Gerbner in the 1960s; it was later expanded upon by Gerbner and Larry Gross in 1976. Gerbner formulated his paradigm for mass communication in 1973 that included three types of analysis: The first type of analysis is institutional process analysis, which looks at what institutions are supporting and distributing the content in question. The second type of analysis is message system analysis. Message system analysis aims to identify the content of message patterns in television and media. The third type of analysis is the cultivation analysis that is define ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
