Tag Archives: scholars

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How can YOU gain perspective? – I. Literative Review

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This post discusses several relevant pieces of literature produced by scholars on the origins of perception and media bias.

In America, citizens have the right to exercise their media literacy skills to search for a vein of truth or a version they can live with. To accomplish this people must cut through the veneer in search of visceral content and that includes stories they may not agree with. But most people are too busy to digest multiple news sources and often feed on news outlets that resonate with their political, social, or environmental positions. So, instead of challenging their views, they merely reinforce them.

Pronin, Kennedy, and Butsch (2006) concluded that people are so confident in their own point of view that others appear biased. In other words, if a co-worker’s views are far from your own, he or she may appear biased to you. Data collected by scholars also suggested that a variety of factors cause perceived bias; for example, an affiliation with a particular political group will alter perception instead of the actual media coverage itself (Ariyanto, Hornsey, & Gallois, 2007; Kim & Pasadeos, 2007). Therefore, people on both sides of an issue will look at the same media story and see it as biased (Ariyanto, Hornsey, & Gallois, 2007; Kim & Pasdeos, 2007).

People unconsciously allow the media to build their perception and eventually manipulate their belief systems. So, how can people re-construct their personal views? Is it possible? I argue that people can change by supplementing their media mix. If individuals use one source like Fox News, but do not supplement it with other views their perception will be limited. The same could be said for those who take in a daily diet of only CNN or Al Jazeera. Aday, Livingston, and Hebert (2005) deduced from their research that during the lead up to the Iraq War, American networks barely mentioned the growing dissent in the US and worldwide that brought millions of people out to rallies and marches. In contrast, Al Jazeera devoted 6.7% of its airtime to the issue of dissent (Aday, Livingston, & Herbert, 2005). Would the Bush administration have sold the public on initiating the war if Americans had heard in greater detail about the worldwide and U.S. dissent on the news? Sadly, we will never know.

In sum, scholars have analyzed the origins of perception bias and concluded that people base their perception of events on the following:

1) what they watch, listen, or read,
2) which political party they affiliate with, and
3) a host of other factors.

In America, many people grew up with only three television networks and they still rely on these sources today. However, young people growing up with new technologies prefer a plethora of options and are ripe to learn how to use them. In that regard, media literacy advocates must continue to encourage people of all ages to vary their media mix to ensure more balance and a broader perspective.


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Making the invisible visible … – II. Analysis

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This post will discuss findings from two scholarly papers and explore why making the invisible visible could cause volatility for Palestinians and others.

Shani Orgad asserted that making the “invisible visible” in the 24-hour transnational news arena could actually “increase instability and amplify the volatility” of the people and the act it exposes (Orgad, 2008, p. 319). Orgad goes on to list several cases where the media visibility caused a negative reaction for formerly invisible people. Orgad suggests that people start to doubt themselves and sees this as a negative. I argue that this awkward stage of doubting oneself or one’s country is part of a growth process. Orgad substantiated this with the ‘rest of the story’ about France and the negative worldwide exposure it gained from the 2005 riots; as a result, France now has their own 24-hour transnational channel. Maybe this is because of the self-examination after the riots, maybe not.

To use Orgad’s (2008) illustration, transnational news is a “multi-faceted” mirror and sometimes reflects an image or side of a country that the leaders do not want others to see (p. 320). For people practicing their media literacy skills, this environment of multiple versions is ripe for gaining perspective and analyzing elements of various stories. In contrast, as Orgad (2008) points out, citizens may become cynical, lose faith in the news, and alienate themselves which therefore, could jeopardize democracy (p. 321). Orgad may have a point here, but this is clearly why America needs to educate and encourage it’s citizens about the media literacy movement.

To that end, Aday, Livingston, and Hebert’s (2005) research substantiated that the networks in their project all framed the Iraq War. These networks included ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox New Channel (FNC), and Al-Jazeera. Each network framed the story according to what they saw as the salient issue, but the reality for people honing their media literacy skills is: “what is covered and what is not” (Aday, Livingston, & Herbert, 2005, p. 11). CNN and FNC showed significantly more stories about battles, tactics, and strategy with a steady stream of military experts offering their opinions. However, the networks barely showed the dissent in the U.S. (one-fifth of Americans) or the “widespread elite opposition” around the world (Aday, Livingston, & Hebert, 2005, p. 11). In contrast, and as mentioned in an earlier post, Al-Jazeera spent 6.7% of their stories on the dissent topic (Aday, Livingston, & Hebert, 2005).

Interestingly, Al-Jazeera made the invisible visible. It covered the humanitarian side of the war, the civilian casualties, the bloody perspective. In an interesting twist, the scholars pointed out that “Al Jazeera did not air many stories on civilian casualties, contrary to conventional wisdom” (Aday, Livingston, & Hebert, 2005). So, why did Americans hear over-and-over again that Al-Jazeera is so unbalanced? Were people in America really watching Al-Jazeera or just sound-bites over-and-over again on CNN or FNC?

According to American journalist and FNC anchor, Brit Hume, the civilian casualties were “merely part of war and not deserving of significant coverage” (as cited in Aday, Livingston, Hebert, 2005, p. 12). I argue that if one of my loved ones were a victim, I would feel differently. It would be significant to me and I would want people to know. Networks that sanction providing a sanitized version of war are doing a disservice to mankind. The fact that the networks continue to highlight or low-light certain issues should provide scholars and people who believe in the need to educate the populace about the media literacy movement the fuel they need to move forward.


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