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I am a wife, mother, business owner and A Doctor of Psychology with an emphasis in media. I studied Psychology and Media at Tennessee State University and Fielding Graduate University at a time when the world is alluded by propaganda, framing, social media, narrative's and a vast amount of media genre eager to divert our attention in a positive or negative way. My hope, through my rigorous, hands on training and studies (10+ years), is to offer insight on "how media is influencing our behavior." This perspective has been lacking since our media evolution has shaped into a universe of it's own.

Sunday, May 3, 2009

Consumer Psychology

Gatekeeping is the hierarchical structure of formal organizations that places certain individuals or groups in crucial positions from which they can control access to goods, services, or information. They, therefore wield power far in excess of their formal authority (Highbeam.com)
 The gatekeeper is a person or people who decide which information will pass through or not. In the media realm, the gatekeepers control the public knowledge by letting some stories pass through and not others. For example, in the film This Film Is Not Yet Rated, the Motion Pictures Association of America (MPAA) has industry raters that operate anonymously as the gatekeepers for the film industry. The MPAA controls 95% of the film business. They rate movies from G, PG, PG-13, NC-17 and X. Each rating has control on what extent and to what capacity the movie will be seen. The rating will also control on how the movies will be distributed and marketed. Kirby Dick states, “The anonymous raters are untrained, given no standards by which to judge movies, have no apparent qualifications, and whose seemingly arbitrary decisions and inconsistent applications of standards determine film content and have played an informal role in shaping cultural landscape.” Nonetheless, media gate-keeping is showed to base their decisions on news values, organizational routines, input structure and common sense. An example of the MPAA rating system is the rating on the movie Boys Don’t Cry. The MPAA rated this movie an NC-17. The reasons: One of the scenes portrayed an actresses wiping semen off her mouth, an anal rape, and a long orgasmic scene.

Bias that contribute to gate-keeping starts with the person or people who decide what passes through or not.

Do we as consumers feed into what the producers and directors what us to see? Do consumers have to accept not knowing the full story? Or do we accept only what the media wants us to know?

Take-Away: Gate-keeping is necessary because the public should have some information censored. But in contrast, it can create a unilateral view of the topic and give an incomplete perspective.

References:
http://www.wordsinspace.net/ (cartoon image)
www.itbusiness.ca/.../Mar31/gatekeepers.jpg (diagram image)
This film is Not Yet Rated, 2006
www.HighBeam.com
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatekeeper_(politics)
www.slideshare.net/adrodgers/news-gatekeeping-146206 - 46k


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