Media Influences on Prosocial Social Behaviour (10 marks)

One Explanation of Media influences on Prosocial Behaviour is Social Learning Theory (SLT) which says that the prosocial behaviour seen in the media is observed, learnt and imitated. Social Learning Theory as a whole and the idea that we imitate behaviour we observe was supported by a study conducted by Bandura where children watched adults show violent of non-violent behaviour towards a bobo doll before being allowed to interact with it themselves. It was found that Children copied the behaviour shown by the adults in their condition. This supports Social Learning Theory as it shows that we do imitate behaviour that we observe and it supports SLT as an explanation of Media influences on Prosocial Behaviour by suggesting that we imitate what behaviour we see and therefore this would occur for the Prosocial behaviour we see in the media also.

Banduras study however can be criticised as demand characteristics could have been apparent in the children taking part in the study and they could have shown violent/non-violent behaviour towards the doll as they knew to beforehand and not because of the behaviour they observed. One child was even recorded saying ‘there’s the doll we are meant to hit’ on the way into the study which suggests there was demand characteristics apparent in the participants which means the results could be based on untruthful evidence.

Another Explanation is Parental Mediation which says that talking to a child about what they have seen and reinforcing the message can increase the usefulness of the message as the message the children pick up form the media is said to be very short lasting if not reinforced.

Fogel (2007) conducted a study to support Parental Mediation by having 8-12 year olds in California watch an episode of ‘Hang Out’, one group with a parent and one group without. He found that Parental Mediation does in fact reinforce the message however they have to discuss the message properly with the child for it to help at all.

Studies into the effect of the media on prosocial behaviour can be criticised as they are all carried out into the short term effects and therefore we do not have any insight into the long term effects of the media which could be completely different to those in the short term. Also research can only show a correlation and not a cause and effect and there is a chance that it is other variables effecting prosocial behaviour within the studies rather than the media such as how the participant have been brought up.