Social Influence on the Formation of Attitudes toward Political Personalities in Children
Keywords:
children, attitude, society, political personalities, free association testAbstract
Authors aimed to study the influence of TV and parents on the  formation of attitudes towards political personalities in children. Experiment was conducted in 2003 and 2006 (E series A and B respectively) in Georgia. Year of 2003 was distinguished by the widespread social-political protest against the government with mass media and general community openly supporting and propagating opposition leaders, while the year of 2006 was a period of relatively stable political situation. In both, A as well as B, third graders of elementary schools of both sexes, mean age 7.5, served as an experimental subjects. Photo of the flower (aster)  was presented to each subject with a request to give a name to the flower that first comes to the mind. Experimental subjects were not familiar with the botanical name of the flower. Majority of subjects named the flower sample by the name of opposition leaders in the A. No names of political leaders have been registered in the B. Association of the flower with the name of a particular person reflects the mental connection of two emotionally positive stimuli – flower and person, which is nice to the subject. According to parents witness, adult household used to watch TV political broadcasts as well as to discuss political events in the presence of experimental subjects in 2003. Children in primary school age, not capable of understanding complicated social events, rely on the social environment bringing interpretation of political events and persons. Presumably results obtained demonstrate the strong TV and parental influence on the formation of positive attitudes of children towards political personalities.
Â
References
Anderson CA., Bercowitcz L., Donnerstein E. et al. The influence of media violence on youth.Psychological sciences in the public interest 4 (3), 1403-1416, 2003.
Gerbner, G. Cultivation analysis: An overview. Mass Communication and Society, (3-4), 175-194.,1998
Gerbner, G., Gross, L., Jackson-Beeck, M., Jeffries-Fox, S. Signorielli, N. Cultural indicators violence profile no. 9. Journal of Communication, 28(3), 176-207., 1978
Gerbner, G., Gross, L., Morgan, M., Signorielli, N. Living with television: The dynamics of the cultivation process. Perspectives on media effects. Hilldale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. pp. 17–40, 1986
Kaid, L. L., and C. Holtz-Bacha, editors. Political Advertising in Western Democracies. Newbury Park, California: Sage, 1995.
Kunkel, D., Cope, K., Farinola, W., Biely, E., Rollin, E., & Donnerstein, E. Sexual messages on entertainment TV in the USA. Children in the New Media Landscape, 155-158., 2000
Latané, B. The psychology of social impact. (2000). American Psychologist, 36, 343-356, 1981
Papalia, D. E., Olds, S. W., & Feldman, R. D. A Child’s World: Infancy Through Adolescence (9th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill, 2002
Roberts, D., Foehr, U., Rideout, V. Generation M: Media in the lives of 8-18 year olds. Menlo Park, CA: Kaiser Family Foundation, 2005
Sanders M, Montgomery DT, Brechman-Tuissaint ML. The mass media and the prevention of child behavior problems: The evaluation of TV series to promote positive outcomes for parents and their children. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 41 (7), 933-948, 2000
Savage, JS., Fisher, JO., Birch LL. Parental Influence on Eating Behavior. ,2004
Stice, E., & Shaw, H. Prospective relations of body image, eating, and affective disturbances to smoking onset in adolescent girls: How Virginia slims. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology (71), 129-135, 2003
Taylor, L. D. and Hansen, D. L. Sexual information, Internet/magazines and TV. Encyclopedia of Children, Adolescents and the Media. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. 763-765, 2004
Ward, L. M. Understanding the role of entertainment media in the sexual socialization of American youth: A review of empirical research. Developmental Review (23), 347-388, 2003
Wolf, N. The beauty myth: How images of beauty are used against women. New York: Anchor Books, pp 348, 1991
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
- Papers must be submitted on the understanding that they have not been published elsewhere (except in the form of an abstract or as part of a published lecture, review, or thesis) and are not currently under consideration by another journal published by any other publisher.
- It is also the authors responsibility to ensure that the articles emanating from a particular source are submitted with the necessary approval.
- The authors warrant that the paper is original and that he/she is the author of the paper, except for material that is clearly identified as to its original source, with permission notices from the copyright owners where required.
- The authors ensure that all the references carefully and they are accurate in the text as well as in the list of references (and vice versa).
- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).
- The journal/publisher is not responsible for subsequent uses of the work. It is the author's responsibility to bring an infringement action if so desired by the author.
