Imagine a typical TV advertisement.  Whether it is for a car or a perfume or a drink, you don’t expect to receive a lot of ‘information’ on the product.  It’s all about ‘image’ – the car glinting in the sun, as it navigates scenic roads, the bite of thirst as you see the drink pouring over ice, or the allure of the woman supposedly wearing the perfume!

Does it work?  £15,700 million annually says that it does.  That was the amount spent on advertising in Britain last year[1].  To put that in perspective, that’s about £250 for each man, woman and child in Britain – roughly £1,000 per average family.  We are talking a huge amount of money here, especially when you note that average household income is under £30,000 a year and much of that is tied up in the cost of housing and the like.  Perhaps £20,000 in family expenditure is being fought over by the advertisers, and they are spending £1,000 to win a bigger share of your money.  They do it year in and year out, for the simple reason that it works.  An advertising campaign takes place, and sales go up, directly and often dramatically.

We are influenced

So, we are being influenced; and not so much by information – more by ‘image’, by saying ‘this is admired’ (and we are expected to copy it because we want to be admired too), or by presenting an experience of intense pleasure which makes us want to experience that pleasure ourselves - generating an appetite in us.

But the fact is that we’ve been influenced.  It happens every day.  If it happens through advertising (and one cannot doubt that it does, or the money would not be spent), then it surely happens through movies, TV, magazine articles, video games, the media in general.

But how?  The same way as with advertising.  The media presents, with all the power of image, what will make us admired or what will give us intense pleasure.  So, you see a movie with the hero acting in a ‘cool’ way.  It’s presented in such a way as to make us admire the hero and to know that we, too, would be admired if we acted the same way.  We want to copy them.  In the same way that we copy what other people wear (and try and wear the same kind of thing as others to a party – otherwise we feel awkward), so it is that we get our idea about how anything should be done by observing others and following suit; and much of our idea about what others do, and are admired for doing, is in fact given to us by the media, which reflects (or claims to reflect) the ‘real world’.

Likewise with pleasure.  We get many of our ideas about what is pleasurable by seeing characters in a soap opera or a movie apparently experiencing some kind of ecstasy.   That may be something morally neutral like diving into a refreshing pool and feeling great – and it makes us want to be refreshed, too (and feel what they are feeling).  Or it may be something more morally loaded, like apparently getting satisfaction from doing violence or making threats – which may also put us in mind to do the same thing.

The media and values

This then gives us a clue as to the potential impact of the media on values – on concepts of right and wrong.  Bad things can be shown in a negative light, a positive light, or completely without comment.  If what is wrong is repeatedly shown in a positive light, any sense that it is in fact wrong is bound to fade, unless that sense is strongly reinforced from another direction.  If it is shown ‘without comment’, the same thing may well still happen – because it starts to be seen as normal and (by implication) acceptable.

If selfishness is projected as ‘cool’ (which it is, often), if anger is projected as satisfying, if a one-night stand is portrayed as romantic and fulfilling, if rudeness is presented as normal and perhaps funny – then we shouldn’t be surprised if people start copying those things and ceasing to think of them as ‘negative’ at all.

Which brings us to role models.  Young people learn far more from what their heroes do than from what they are instructed to do.  What if their heroes (be it fictional ones in movies, or live ones like footballers) are antisocial, moody, selfish and arrogant?  What are they learning?  What are we teaching them?

It doesn’t take much imagination to realize that the whole tenor of a culture can and will be swayed by the way ‘cool’ and ‘acceptable’ are portrayed in the media.

So, what are the pressures on the media?  Why wouldn’t they all behave like Walt Disney and make family-friendly movies with nice morals and uplifting messages?   Uplifting movies do in fact sell.  But, human nature being what it is, we have just as much of an appetite for movies and storylines and images that express the bad in us as for those that express the good.  Most of us are the same.  Feeling angry or upset?  Watch a violent movie and we’ll get some kind of satisfaction, or release.  And so on, across a range of human emotions.

The impact on us

But what does that do to us, long term?  It is now clear that it entrenches and fuels the feelings we have within us – it fans the flame, as it were.  Thus, many school teachers we have spoken to report that a violent film on TV the night before will result in ‘mayhem’ and aggressive behaviour acted out in the school playground the next morning.  This has been borne out by academic research.  For example, a leading review involved laboratory assessments of children’s behaviour after they had watched scenes of violence, and investigations in the community to see whether children who watched lots of violent scenes were more prone to violence or law-breaking.  It found that such viewing had substantial short-term effects on children’s emotions and increased the likelihood of aggression.  It concluded that “The availability of video film, satellite and cable TV in the home allows children to access violent media inappropriate to their age, development stage and mental health”.  And “Carelessness with material that contains extreme violent and sexual imagery might even be regarded as a form of emotional child maltreatment”.[2]   Similarly, a new study, using electrodes to test the reactions of teenage boys to violent videos, found that "continued exposure to violent videos will make an adolescent less sensitive to violence, more accepting of violence, and more likely to commit aggressive acts since the emotional component associated with aggression is reduced and normally acts as a break on aggressive behaviour". [3]

This awareness of influence is shared by a large majority of British people.  In a YouGov poll, 64% of those questioned supported the view that “children are likely to copy the violence they see on television”, while only 27% disagreed.[4]

And yet, this kind of violence is constantly fed to our children (and to ourselves – are we really so different?), in spite of our growing understanding of what it will do.[5] Is this not crazy?  Indeed, 54% parents admit to allowing children under the age of five to watch programmes considered to be orientated towards adults, including EastEnders, which has covered issues such as rape, murder, drug addiction and child abuse.  And in 2009, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers warned that unsupervised access to TV was leading to a rise in pupils swearing, storming out of classrooms and answering back. [6]

It is also widely experienced that cruel and threatening images seen in movies can continue to haunt people through nightmares, anxiety and a pervasive sense of being unsafe.  The effects can be life-long.  A fascinating study by Professor Joanne Cantor of Wisconsin University found through interviewing hundreds of adults that the 1984 'slasher movie', A Nightmare on Elm Street, resulted in many sleepless nights.  Professor Cantor says, "This film provided the quintessential recipe for insomnia because the bloodthirsty villain, Freddy Kruger, could only attack you in your dreams, so your only defence against him was to stay awake - and that's what many reported doing".  And again, "It is hard for our conscious mind to damp down our physiological reactions.  For example, people who had an adverse reaction to Jaws not only find themselves scared of going into the ocean, but also find themselves scared of going into lakes and pools, even though they know there is no possibility of finding a shark in either".   Hitchcock's film Psycho has had a similar effect.  "Many women in my studies who saw that movie are uncomfortable in the shower to this day".[7]  It is as if we are putting slow-working poison into our system daily, and then wondering why we feel increasingly ill.

And if this influence is so obvious in the field of violence, then how can it be less so in other sensitive areas, such as how we behave with the opposite sex (huge pressure to prove ourselves – and therefore effectively to ‘use’ others), or how we think about those in authority (like the police, who are often portrayed as enemies, because that makes good entertainment)?  And what will happen to ‘nice manners’ if role models are routinely rude obnoxious and crude?  What has happened to them?

What we want?

Media businesses can always claim they are just providing the public with what they want.  But is this valid?  A recent poll by the Radio Times found that 69% said there was too much swearing on TV, while 74% thought there was too much violence[8].  High figures indeed.  The retort could always be that no-one has to see these things.  There is the ‘off button’ for those who don’t want them and they are merely available for those that do.  But actually one would have to become a monk or a hermit these days to avoid exposure to routine swearing and violence on TV – it’s everywhere and, in practice, is very difficult to avoid.

Years ago, a speech by a ‘media mogul’ denied any connection between TV violence and real life; but then (about 20 minutes later) went on to applaud the positive influence of television.  It is inspiring, he said, to see Wimbledon on the TV and then drive around and see public tennis courts full of young people in the days that follow, trying their own hand at the sport.[9] But one cannot have it both ways.  Either TV and other media can inspire for good, in which case they can obviously also influence for harm s well, or both must go out of the window.  But it is clear enough that the influence is strong, for good or for ill; it is therefore up to us, as a society, to pay some real attention to how we are letting ourselves (particularly the young) be influenced and – where it is obviously harmful – putting a brake on it.

Lets start by agreeing that, where entertainment influences real life, real life is infinitely the more important.

And lets perhaps further agree that anything that shapes the development, behaviour and values of our young should not just be left to market forces, where there was always money to be made out of notoriety and enticing people to cross the boundaries.  After all, which would win the classroom vote every time: “today we’ll burn the desks and run riot”; or “today, we’ll study maths”?