The past decade's research on the use and effects of older (television, music, movies, magazines) and newer media (the Internet, cell phones, social networking) on adolescents' health and well-being is reviewed. A portrait of patterns of use of the media is provided and then the predictors and effects of those patterns on adolescents' mental health is discussed. Research on the effects of exposure to specific kinds of content on adolescents' aggressive behavior, gender roles, sexual relationships, body image disturbances, obesity, and substance use also are reviewed. Finally, media literacy as a promising strategy for enhancing adolescents' use of the media in the future is considered.
This chapter focuses on the role media play in the sexual socialization of adolescents and emerging adults in modern societies. The review of relevant research and theory is organized around the Sexual Media Practice Model’s core components of identity, selection, engagement, and application, which are based on the following assumptions: (1) media consumers are active participants and sometimes content producers; (2) selection and use of sexual media are motivated by the adolescent’s identity or sexual self-concept; (3) sexual media effects are a cyclical process, such that sexual content may be sought that reinforces existing tendencies that leads to further use of relevant content and further effects; and (4) friends and peers are important throughout the process in generating, sharing, and interpreting media. The discussion includes suggestions for further research and an examination of potential media-related solutions to enhance healthy adolescent sexuality.
Public opinion has embraced social media as a vital tool to reach U.S. emerging adults, but this generation has not universally adopted social media technologies. Using indepth interviews, this study examined the characteristics of 20 emerging adults (18 to 23 years old) who were nonadopters of social media. Compared to social media users, non-adopters had less economic stability, more fractured educational trajectories, and weaker support from parents and friends.Non-adopters did not use social media because they lacked access or leisure time, were not socialized into their use, lacked skills, or did not want to maintain social contacts via social media technologies. If social media are increasingly used in attempts to improve young people's lives, practitioners must understand who is left behind in the wake of these technologies.
This study examined the joint effect of message and personality attributes on online news sharing. In two experiments ( N = 270, N = 275), readers indicated their likelihood to share news representing two content domains and three informational utility dimensions. A moderated mediation path analysis was used. On average, news consumers shared news containing informational utility. Opinion leaders shared news irrespective of informational utility because they discerned informational utility in news that, objectively speaking, lacked such utility. In one experiment, opinion leaders also were more likely than nonleaders to share news perceived to contain informational utility.
This study measured the prevalence of religious self-disclosure in public MySpace profiles that belonged to a subsample of National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR) wave 3 respondents (N=560). Personal attributes associated with religious identification as well as the overall quantity of religious self-disclosures are examined. A majority (62 percent) of profile owners identified their religious affiliations online, although relatively few profile owners (30 percent) said anything about religion outside the religion-designated field. Most affiliation reports (80 percent) were consistent with the profile owner's reported affiliation on the survey. Religious profile owners disclosed more about religion when they also believed that religion is a public matter or if they evaluated organized religion positively. Evangelical Protestants said more about religion than other respondents. Religiosity, believing that religion is a public matter, and the religiosity of profile owners' friendship group were all positively associated with religious RELIGION IN SOCIAL MEDIA 2 identification and self-disclosure.
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