New Media and Commercialism

INTRODUCTION
In this unit, we have been asked to take all of the information from the other units (which has been very introspective) and turn it around. We now are looking at the world with a similar level detail that we have been using on ourselves. Out of the different topics, I chose to dive deeper into new media and commercialism, specifically the correlation between media and the effects on a woman's body image. To keep my range of research broad I posed the question: How does the media effect a woman's body image/sense of self? To start off the project, I brainstormed some possible subtopics for research and organized them in a concept map.

WHAT I LEARNED

How does the media affect a woman’s body image and sense of self?

            In today’s culture, the expectations that have been placed on women about their appearance are extreme and unattainable. Even though the desired look for women is mostly unattainable, they still attempt to achieve the unattainable which leads to eating disorders, depression, and a variety of other mental imbalances. How do these ideas come about? The media. As beauty products, clothing brands, etc. are advertised using models that are way too thin or photos that are more edited than they are original, they are passively asserting that this is how all women should look when in fact the women that are being portrayed are either not real or unhealthy.

            Unfortunately, it’s not just older women feeling the pressure. According to a study published in the article “The Media’s Effect on Women’s Body Image”, “the correlation between media image and body image has been proven; in one study, among European American and African American girls ages 7-12, greater overall television exposure predicted both a thinner ideal adult body shape and a higher level of disordered eating one year later. Adolescent girls are the most strongly affected demographic.” There are programs and studies being conducted that look to reverse the effects of media on young women. “An intervention for the negative influence of media on body esteem” outlines an experiment and results of such a program. The article acknowledges that is nearly impossible to distinguish what factors are affecting the women for the better, but it also discusses how some improvements in body image were noted amongst the experimental groups. After being shown what the average American woman looks like compared to the models, some of the subjects became “enlightened” and realized that the models in advertisements are nowhere near normal.

            Another negative impact on women, due to media, is the acceptance of violence against women. Neil Malamuth and James Check address this in “The effects of Mass Media exposure on Acceptance of Violence against Women: A Field Experiment”. These two men completed an experiment amongst males and females that exposed them, and essentially desensitized, to violent movies. Interestingly enough, the desensitiziaion happened more amongst the males, while the females became more sensitive about the fact of violence against women. This is where the sense of self comes in because many women base their success off of men and a man’s acceptance of themselves and their appearance. Unfortunately, many women put up with abuse from a man because they are afraid that no other man will want them, and on the other end men becoming more and more okay with abusing women because the media is saying that it is okay.

            While there are plenty of arguments against the media and its influences on culture, it would be unfair to mention the upside of idealized advertisements. The fact that many Americans are severely overweight is no secret, and we wish to change that. If models all of a sudden were all obese, that would become normal and society’s weight would just continue to spiral out of control, as stated in “The Effect of the Media on Women’s Personal Identity”. In conclusion, the media is a powerful standard needs balance in order to promote healthy habits for its followers.

WHAT I'D LIKE TO LEARN

            In learning about the specific effect of the media’s influence on women, there are many related topics that I would like to explore in the future. First of all, I’d like to differentiate between the different age demographics, and how the age of exposure affects a female’s body image. I would also like to expand my research to the male gender. I’m sure that women are not the only ones feeling pressure from the media about their appearances and role in society, but I think that it affects men in a different way which is why there is not as much research readily available on the topic. Another aspect of this research that I think could be expanded on would be what parts of the media tend to correspond with various psychological disturbances. For instance, there is supposedly heightened aggression in children who played violent video games, but is there a point in time where the effect the video games has on the children is greater? The combinations of media and demographics are infinite because the media grows exponentially every few years, and humans have such complex diversities. I am also very curious to look at data from beauty supply companies that show their client demographics as well as gross income over the past twenty to fifty years. I predict that the age of clientele has expanded in both directions over the past few years because girls want to wear make-up earlier and older women are wearing make-up longer. All of this talk of media influence also brings up an interesting point of human psychology and why these powerful franchises can convince a bunch of  women that they are not beautiful without make up, or shiny hair, or a size zero waist. Are there psychologists out there responsible for the mental unraveling of millions of young girls all over the country, or world even? There’s another topic: are countries all over the world experiencing the same pressure from culture to be aesthetically appealing? Back to the psychologists though, why haven’t more people raised hell about this? Why do we let trained professionals trick us into buying products that we do not need? Speaking of things that we do not need, another industry that benefits greatly from the general insecurity of the American culture right now is the clothing industry. Everybody must have the hip, new clothes- all the time. Therefore, people are buying clothes before the old ones wear out, just because of the fear of looking “outdated”. I think that for all the good the media does for our world, we really need to pick through it with a fine toothed comb to weed out the negative influences before they do too much harm. 

                                                                           

VIDEO EXERCISES

            With these tasks, I really centered my attention on video literacy: which is the idea of being well-versed in all  aspects related to video and video composing. I started by exploring the Internet Archives with an eye for any footage or sound clips that I thought would be an interesting blend. After finding content and watching tutorials, I was finally ready to start creating. I definitely see the parallels between working with sound and with video, but I found video to be significantly more difficult. There are so many more aspects to think about and to coordinate with video, but that being said the final product is much more rewarding than an audio assignment. I personally enjoy experiencing the result of visual and aural intricacies, as opposed to just aural or just visual. 

Double Exposure

Parallel Edit

RESEARCH ORIENTED VIDEO COMPOSITION

        To compliment my research project, I am thinking about having a comparison of models vs "real" women/the effects of media on humans. (before/after pictures of plastic surgery/eating disorders, etc). As far as music, I haven't decided if I want it to be a happy-go-lucky women empowerment video, or if I want a somber mood as to inform the public of the severity of this problem and just how serious it is. Both are valid points, in my opinion, so I think  I"ll make that decision based off of the content I am able to find. 

PROJECT VIDEO COMPOSITION

To complete this project, I used a variety of public domain resources: the internet archives and creative commons( which led me to places like youtube, soundcloud, spinxpress, and google images). For this project I explored a little bit more of what the software has to offer like transitions and the text capabilities. I also experimented with the voice-overs, but they didn't make the final cut. Most of my composition is parallel-cut. The process took me much longer than I anticipated..finding material was actually very, very difficult! I didn't have a crystal clear idea of what I wanted, but I thought I would be inspired by what I saw, rather it took me hours to get going on an idea that I liked. Once I had a clearer idea of what I wanted, I could maneuver the public domain websites a little better, but without a clear and concise idea of what I wanted, I found the search engines on these websites to be insufficient. Once I had most of the material I thought that I was going to use, I composed it in what I thought would be my final edit; however, I stumbled across one final video that inspired me thus I reconfigured my entire composition. I still struggled a little with the technical aspect of Camtasia, but I feel myself becoming quicker and more well-versed with the software, and I'm sure with every practice I'll become more literate. 

WORKS CITED

"The Effect of the Media on Women's Personal Identity." The Effect of the Media on Women's Personal Identity. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Mar. 2013. <http://en.articlesgratuits.com/article.php?id_article=437>.

Everybody Knows That Mass Media Are/are Not a Cause of Eating Disorders: A Critical Review of Evidence for a Casual Link between Media, Negative Body Image, and Disordered Eating in Females (2009): 9-42. EbscoHost. Web. 27 Mar. 2013. <http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=428642fb-7c6a-4417-aac3-634a2846001e%40sessionmgr13&hid=104>.
Gross, Liza. "Invisible in the Media." EbscoHost. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Mar. 2013. <http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=5&sid=e6778393-ce17-48d4-866f-24939ef62882%40sessionmgr110&hid=106>.

Haas, Cheryl J., Laura A. Pawlow, Jon Pettibone, and Dan J. Segrist. "An Intervention for the Negative Influence of Media on Body Esteem." EbscoHost. N.p., n.d. Web. <http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=4&sid=428642fb-7c6a-4417-aac3-634a2846001e%40sessionmgr13&hid=7>.

Malamuth, Neil M., and James V.P. Check. "The Effects of Mass Media Exposure on Acceptance of Violence against Women: A Field Experiment." UCLA, n.d. Web. 27 Mar. 2013. <http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/comm/malamuth/pdf/81Jrp15.pdf>.
McCabe, Marita P., Kelly Butler, and Christina Watt. "Media Influences on Attitudes and Perceptions Toward the Body Among Adult Men and Women." EbscoHost. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Mar. 2013. <http://ehis.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?vid=9&sid=e6778393-ce17-48d4-866f-24939ef62882%40sessionmgr110&hid=3>.

"The Media's Effect on Women's Body Image - News, Sports, Events - Hamilton College." The Media's Effect on Women's Body Image - News, Sports, Events - Hamilton College. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Mar. 2013.