My Media Research Experiment Propasal: Reality television shows (Bad Girl Club, The Hills, All "love" shows, All the housewives, Jersey Shore, and etc. )have a neagtive impact on people, more specifically towards teenagers ages 14-17.
My laboratory experiment will be a random sampling of teenagers ages 14-17. I would use the Social Learning Theory and see how teenagers lives change by watching these shows on a daily basis. At first the teenagers will go through random surveys based on their daily life and social life before we begin the experiment. The teenagers would have to watch reality shows from 5-7 hours a day. This experiment will go on for about 1 month. After the experiment, I will use the survey method and ask them the same exact questions they were asked before at the end of the experiment. My hypothesis would be tested on the comparison of the before and after survey answers. I predict that the teens daily/social life will somewhat have a negative affect by watching the reality shows. Teenagers will mimic what others are doing just to be like them.
I like this proposal, I think it would have interesting results. Like, at what point is it the tv show or networks responsibility, and how much is the responsibility of the viewer (or their parents). Even shows like 16 and Pregnant, even though they have an underlying message to NOT get pregnant young, how can watching these shows appear glamorous to some?
ReplyDeleteYour experiment highlights some difficulties of research. What if they're already watching the shows? If not, how do you get people to watch 5-7 hours of specific shows per day for a month? What kinds of questions will generate the kind of results you're looking for? How do you measure "negative"?
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