Media Effects

Does exposure to media violence make us more violent? Do stereotypes in the media affect the way we see different social groups? Do media institutions play any role in social change?

Media Effects is a concise introduction which studies the ways in which media use affects society. James Shanahan explores how researchers and society became interested in media effects, outlines the important developments in the field, and looks at how research on narrative is playing a progressively important role in revealing what we know. The book also provides a timely interweaving of different perspectives, ranging from concerned and critical voices within media studies to quantitative psychological approaches which tend to be more sceptical about powerful media effects.

Concise and authoritative, Media Effects is the go-to text for students and scholars getting to grips with this fascinating and important topic. Preface

Acknowledgments

1 Introduction

“Media effects”: What are they?

“Media effects”: An etymology

Opinion

“Mass” communication

“A word has appeared”: Propaganda

Public opinion

Toward media effects

Another way

Critical studies

Cultural studies

Other concerns and outlooks

Summary and outline

Notes

2 A Narrative Perspective

The narrative perspective

Narrative theories, communication, and media

Media effects: Reluctantly focused on persuasion

Recovering orality

Narrative structure

Narrative psychology and the evolution of narrative

The evolution of narrative

Notes

3 Media and Violence

Imitation and social learning

Scientific agreement

New technologies and new concerns: Guns, video games, institutional opinions

An uneasy consensus

Cultural indicators

The Violence Profile

Cultivation

Violence as a cultural indicator

Cultivation and narrative

Notes

4 Media and Social Representation

Representation and effects

Women

African Americans

Sexual minorities and social change

Summary

Notes

5 Media Use and Social Control

Cultural indicators and social control

Authoritarianism

The irony of the turn from propaganda: The reality of powerful media effects

Summary

Notes

6 “New” Media, New Narratives?

Categories of media effects research

The “new” new media?

Post-mass media

Networks and media theory

Two Americas?

Did technology change narrative?

Convergence culture

Digital degradation

Summary

Notes

7 Conclusion

Media as conversation

Conversations and narratives

Symptoms, Dx, and Rx

References

Index

"James Shanahan provides a compelling new map for well-trodden ground, theory and research on media effects. His book is impressively wide-ranging at the same time that it coalesces into sharp focus. I was excited to find new synergies, new insights, and new possibilities for explorations of the ways that the media shape individuals and the wider social world."
—Erica Scharrer, University of Massachusetts

"Too rarely do prominent scholars take the time to pause and take stock of their own academic field. Media Effects is a rare exception. Jim Shanahan offers us his very nuanced and compelling editorial take on almost a century of media effects research that has hopefully learned from its own past. It is particularly refreshing to have one of the eminent media effects researchers of our time help us to separate signal from noise in this rapidly growing field of research."
—Dietram Scheufele, University of Wisconsin

James Shanahan is Dean of the Media School at Indiana University, Bloomington.