Breaking news of social problems: examining media consumption and student beliefs about school shootings

Abstract

Objective: to explore the relationship between college students’ media consumption and their attitude to school shootings in the United States of America.Methods: dialectical approach to cognition of social phenomena, allowing to analyze them in historical development and functioning in the context of the totality of objective and subjective factors, which predetermined the following research methods: formal-logical, comparative-legal, and sociological.Results: School shootings are considered by many to be a social problem in need of a solution. While episodic in nature, they generate fear and concern, particularly as a result of the amount of attention they garner by and through the media. The present study explores the relationship between college students’ media consumption and their beliefs that school shootings are a problem in the United States. A survey was administered to 442 university students in fall 2012 and included measures of specific modes through which media is consumed, including television, newspaper, and social media, which then were analyzed to assess such a relationship. The results indicate that social media—Twitter 2 in particular—are significant predictors of students’ beliefs about school shootings. These findings also represent an important shift in media production that encourages a more participatory discourse with audience members. Implications for journalistic practices, study limitations, and directions for future research also are discussed.Scientific novelty: The present study sought to examine the impact of media consumption on respondents’ beliefs that school shootings are a problem in the U.S. It was hypothesized that there is a positive relationship between the amount of media that students consume and their belief that school shootings are a problem. It was found that the more students use social media, and Twitter in particular, the stronger their beliefs that school shootings are a social problem. Not all media use, however, was related to these beliefs in accordance with cultivation theory.Practical significance: the main provisions and conclusions of the article can be used in scientific, pedagogical and law enforcement activities when considering the issues related to the crime prevention and suppression.