Lecture 3

Values And The Media

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Outline
- Defining values
- Types of values
- Media Influence on Societal Values

Defining values
- Value denotes the degree of importance of some thing or action, with the aim of determining
what actions are best to do or what way is best to live.
- Milton Rokeach: values are learned organization or rules for making choices and for
resolving conflicts.
- Values are shared ideas about what is TRUE, RIGHT, BEAUTIFUL etc. that underlie
cultural patterns and guide society in response to physical and social environment (shared
means held collectively)
- Values are programmed early in our lives and therefore are often NON-RATIONAL
- Values are normative and evaluative – what is good or bad; normal or abnormal
- Beliefs form basis of your values
- Values are organizing systems for attitudes – if you value chastity for instance, this value
may provide guidelines fir forming and developing attitudes.
- Values determine(most of the time) which groups, clubs, organizations and associations one
joins

Types of values
- Values can be classified based on the following typologies:
(1) Personal and cultural values
Personal values
 Provide an internal reference for what is good, beneficial, important, useful,
beautiful, desirable and constructive.
 Values influence behavior and the choices made by an individual.
 What maybe a value to one individual may not be shared by another owing to
individual opinions, attitudes, beliefs and views?
 Are to some extent determined by personality types e.g. introverts, extroverts
or ambiverts.
Cultural values
 Emphasize values that members of a cultural group broadly share.
 Cultural values are determined by factors such as, ethnicity, religion,
education levels, social class, personality, social conformity or non-
conformity, lifestyles, media exposure among others.
(2) Primary, secondary or tertiary values
 Cognitive structures consist of many values – values are largely organized and
exist along a continuum of relative importance – from primary-secondary-
tertiary values.
 Primary – specify what is worth sacrificing of human life; protection of
oneself and family
  Secondary – Alleviation of pain and suffering of others e.g. sharing material
possessions
 Tertiary values – e.g. hospitality

(3) Instrumental and terminal values

 Instrumental values – those that influence your daily decisions e.g. being
ambitious, cheerful, honest, polite etc.
 Terminal values – goals that you strive for – e.g. you desire for happiness,
mature love, security, self-respect, wisdom etc.

Media Influence on Societal Values

Media influence on societal values works in two broad ways:
i. Reinforcing existing beliefs and attitudes.
ii. Contradicting existing beliefs and attitudes.

It is important to note that the media industry is an institution that requires the audience in order
to remain relevant. For that reason, they need to understand not only the needs but also the
culture of the people they serve if they are to provide content that will be well consumed. Should
the media act ignorantly to the cultures of the people, the product they provide the people with
(information) is mostly rejected by the recipient. This is why most content form the media
reinforces the values beliefs and attitudes of their audience. From advertisements, drama
programmes to the news content, much of the information reinforces societal values. For
instance, while it is acceptable for Kenyans to consume Hollywood productions that incorporate
scenes with same sex relationships, local productions that depict such scenes are quickly
condemned by the public. While this may seem like hypocrisy, the difference lies in
understanding that Kenyans acknowledges that it is almost the norm for the western world to
have same sex relationships but shuns the idea of the same among its people. As such, the
Kenyan media cannot afford to carry adverts for instance that promote such behavior as it
contradicts the values of our society.

Think of the Coca-cola advertisement that raise uproar when it depicted a sexual scene as a
feeling of consuming the Coke soda – our culture does have us connecting a beverage to sex in
any way. Other cultures may not see a problem in the same. So while the advert was re-done to
suit the Kenyan market, some other markets retained it as it was. The fear of any media house is
loss of an audience, introduction of unbecoming behavior in our societies, creation of social
deviance and violence, hence the need to reinforcing positive values.

However, there are instances when cultural values maybe contradicted by the media if they are
deemed negative for our societies. E.g. FGM and early marriages are values culturally acceptable
to some communities but ones rejected by the media. The repercussion of this
rejection/contradiction has always been isolation of the media by such communities. The
underlying factor though would be for the media to genuinely acknowledge non-biasness in
rejection of personal or cultural values.
Some communication scholars have argued that on controversial issues e.g. sex and violence, the
mass media either reinforces or contradicts the values people hold. This is explained in four key
theories:

Carthasis Theory
This theory suggests that rather than be harmful violence in the media actually has a positive
effect on society. The central assumption of the catharsis theory is that people in course of their
daily life, build up frustrations. Vicarious participation in others aggression helps to release those
tensions. Thus exposure to violent television content decreases the probability of violent
behaviour.

Aggressive Cues Theory

This holds the opposite view that violence does have an impact. Exposure to aggressive stimuli
will increase physiological and emotional arousal which tends to increase the possibility of
aggressive behaviour. The way in which violence is presented will have an impact on us too. If
we can relate to the violence or if the violence is presented in a justifiable way, we can be led to
aggressive behaviour.

Observational Theory
This one takes the aggressive cues theory a step further. This theory states that people can learn
by, observingin media portrayals and under some conditions model its behaviour. Thus the
theory states that not only does the media violence increase the probability of the audience
committing the violence, it teaches the viewer how to do it.

Reinforcement Theory
The central assumption is that media portrayals reinforce established behaviour viewers bring
with them to the media situation. Violent portrayals will increase the likelihood of violent or
aggressive behaviour for those who accept violence as normal. Instead of looking for blame in
violent media portrayal, the reinforcement theorist would say, if you want to predict an outcome,
look at the viewer’s background i.e. their cultural norms and views of social norms.

Uses and gratification theory