Media's Negative Effects On Adolescents

The media has been known to be very beneficial or detrimental on social issues in society. Furthermore, coinciding with poorly funded and unregulated sex education programs adolescence turns to the media for questions about their sexuality. As a result, debate on whether or not the media negatively impacts adolescent sexuality has been brought into question. With that said my view on the issue is in agreeance that the media does in fact negatively impact adolescent sexuality. There are three main reasons for my side of the argument, which are, how exposure to sexual content in the media affects adolescents views on gender roles, sexual attitudes, and sexual behaviors in a negative way. For the purpose of defending my stance I will provide reasons …show more content…
Not all adolescents are raised by authoritative parents that use rational, issue-orientated manner, and frequently engage in discussion and explanation over discussion with their child to converse his/her questions about sex, drugs, STDs, body image, or how to behave in a relationship; therefore, they turn to other sources for this information such as the media. Henceforth, observational learning, a construct in Bandura’s Social Cognitive theory, suggests people learn behaviors by observing others perform them in addition to reinforcements they receive for the behaviors (Bandura, 1986, p. 69). In other words, a teenager may see a professional athlete, role model, or celebrity they idolize involved with alcohol, drugs, sex, violence, or promoting socially constructed ideas of “beauty”, For example Kylie Jenner’s “Lip Challenge”, where girls painfully use suction on their lips to achieve a fuller lip to look “beautiful”. Furthermore, television shows aimed at teenagers have been found to include more sexual content than those which are adult oriented, yet include little mention of responsibility or contraception (Kunkel, Eyal, Finnerty, Biely, & Donnerstein, 2005, p. 58). Consequently, there is a possible connection with the increase of fathers not taking responsibility of their child and as a result of this many children grow up without a father figure. In spite of this, those on the opposing …show more content…
It is easy to see on TV shows, commercials, and other sources of media that sex is advertised as fun, carefree, and a common activity that doesn’t come with responsibilities or consequences. Numerous studies have found that exposure to sexy media content increases the likelihood of sexual activity and, importantly, hastens the initiation of sexual intercourse (O’Hara, Gibbons, Li, Gerrard, & Sargent, 2013, p. 206). It is known that of all industrialized countries America’s teen birth rate is higher than all other. Although, those in opposition to my stance on the argument may argue that hormones initiate sex rather than social factors or that media can be used to inform teens about risky behaviors and encourage communication with parents. On a study ran on middle school adolescents, Peter & Valkenburg (2007) state it is noteworthy that general screen time, regardless of sexual content, was related to significantly greater likelihood to have ever engaged in sexual intercourse or have three or more partners (p. 393). Therefore it is clear that in addition to hormones, social factors, such as, the media has an impact on the initiation of sex in adolescents and also teens are more likely to mimic the same behaviors seen by celebrities that they like rather than use the media to inform their selves on risky behavior or communicate with an authoritarian, indulgent, or indifferent parent about