The Mean World Syndrome with Answers

Worksheet F: The Mean World Syndrome (10 points) 1. [1pt] What Gerber and his colleagues found was that exposure to media violence had more complicated effects than simply causing people to act violently – effects rooted not only in the quantity of violence in media, but also in its _____ and how it was portrayed to audiences. Quality 2. [1pt] The documentary makes the claim that commercial media has eclipsed religion, art, oral traditions, the family, and all other societal institutions as the great _____ of our time. Storytelling engine 3. [1pt] Children now see about 8,000 murders by the end of elementary school and about _____ violent acts by the age of 18. 200,000 4. [1pt] Gerber argues that most of the violence we routinely see in media is _____ violence – it’s highly entertaining, thrilling, swift, often glamorous, spectacular, humorous, and always leads to a happy ending. Happy 5. [1pt] The documentary claims that what matters most about media violence is not simply the quantity of media violence that saturates the media landscape, but how it all adds up to tell a story – a story that reinforces and _____ a certain view of the world. normalizes 6. [1pt] True or False: The oversimplified view that media violence causes violent behavior has its roots in the earliest media research, which grew out of fears about the sensational and violent content of Hollywood’s first talking motion pictures. TRUE 7. [1pt] An outdated media theory called the ______ claims that media messages act on us directly, like shots from a gun; it’s a view of media violence as ‘all-powerful’ and audiences as essentially passive, and it continues to shape debates about media violence today. Magic Bullet 8. [1pt] True or False: The concept of The Mean World Syndrome refers to how very specific depictions of violence in media can cause individuals to commit horrible, violent acts themselves. TRUE 9. [1pt] True or False: Despite crime being at a historic low over the past 10 years in major cities and border cities across the country where immigration populations are at an all-time high, the majority of Americans feel that more immigration leads to higher crime rates. TRUE 10. [1pt] The documentary claims that media can create an irrationally fearful view of others and the world, making people more easily manipulated and controlled and more likely to accept and even welcome repression if it promises to ______. Relieve their insecurities