Media Impact Project - BLOG

Wanna Try Some VR? Here’s a Guide

4/17/2018

by Johanna Blakley

Lately I’ve been doing a bit of VR bingeing. While I’m not a binge TV viewer, I cannot get enough VR when the opportunity presents itself. Luckily, I’m based in Los Angeles, where new media experiments are all the rage, and my job takes me to exactly the kinds of conferences that showcase new experiments in the field.As you’ve no doubt heard, VR is all the rage right now, syphoning start-up funding from what many believe are more worthy, though less glitzy, projects. Stanford’s Jeremy Bailenson has just published Experience on Demand, which catalogs the many uses for VR, mostly for training or therapy, and VR pioneer Jaron Lanier has just come out with a surprisingly optimistic book, Dawn of the New Everything. Even if you’re skeptical about VR, I strongly urge you to try it out. And not just what you can pop into your Google Cardboard. Before you completely dismiss it, you need to experience it with better hardware, such as Samsung Gear or, even better, the HTC Vive.
Unfortunately, that’s easier said than done. Even if you get the chance to go to South By Southwest or the Future of Storytelling Festival (I went to both last year), you will soon learn that you’ll be facing long, depressing lines, sometimes hours long, for an experience that will last less than ten minutes — sometimes much less. Welcome to the dark side of experiential storytelling.

However, where there’s a will, there’s a way: ask questions, inquire ahead, and see if you can make reservations. IMAX VR now has 6 locations and counting: I loved Eagle Flight and Raw Data, two exhilarating multiplayer games. And museums and cultural centers offer these experiences, as well, often with a more civilized reservation system in place than conferences offer.

And then sometimes you just get lucky. While strolling through Montreal’s old city, I saw a sign saying “Luxury Rubbish:” anyone who knows me knows I wouldn’t pass that up. Turns out it was the gift shop for a cultural arts center that just happened to be hosting a massive VR exhibition curated by none other than the Future of Storytelling.

Needless to say, I showed up the moment the place opened, on a day the staff recommended as a low-traffic day, and spent half a day in other worlds of many people’s making. Afterwards I knew I must share a guide to these experiences so that unlucky others can figure out which line they should get into at the next SXSW, Sundance, Tribeca or Future of Storytelling Festival.

Instead of offering reviews of quality and preference, my goal here is to give some indication of what new realities these VR pieces explore: are you interested in how VR might transform books, art, dance, games or movies? Then read on, my friend.

The First Lady on Social Media

1/4/2018

by Johanna Blakley

Washington Post reporter Krissah Thompson contacted me recently asking me if I had any thoughts about Melania Trump’s use of social media. I thought it was a fascinating question and so I started digging into her Instagram and Twitter accounts.

I must say, I found both feeds really dispiriting. I suspect that a lot of people who follow her closely and rate her highly might feel sorry for her. There is very little evidence that she is sharing anything remotely personal, which is what primarily attracts people to the social media feeds of celebrities and other powerful public figures. (The big exception, which might prove the rule, is her last Instagram post, a flirty close-up with a Santa hat.)

You might assume that Melania Trump is simply uninterested in the public stage or is uncomfortable sharing her private life with the public, but her personal Twitter feed, which she hasn’t updated since election day, is filled with personal preferences and observations that feel quite intimate. So much so, that I’m pretty sure I could pick out a gift for her (and flowers!) that I know she’d like. That is what’s so powerful about these social platforms: they can make you feel as if you really know someone. But the carefully coiffed woman featured in the FLOTUS feeds seems distant and disconnected. I couldn’t help but wonder whether her approval rating is higher than her husband’s precisely because she withholds so much, which gives her the patina of dignity.

Of course it’s tempting to compare Melania Trump’s social media presence with that of her predecessor, Michelle Obama. While the former first lady’s feed was also loaded with official events, she often spoke at those events, and through various media outlets, which allowed her to post material filled with her voice, her attitude, and her humor. She also had the habit of posting personal musings in the official FLOTUS account, which were differentiated from the rest of the feed with the initials “mo.” You don’t see any intimate asides from Melania Trump.

The vast majority of the photos she posts are documentation of formal events: she’s basically caught on camera performing her duty. What you don’t tend to see is her looking into the camera, or trying to connect with the American public, as Michelle Obama does quite convincingly in her photos and videos. Our current first lady seems to see herself as someone to be seen – which makes sense given her professional modeling career – but strikes me as a bit chilling in her new role, which is endowed with tremendous cultural and political power. The big question is, will she ever choose to wield it?

Read Thompson’s Washington Post article.

15 Ways Documentary Makers Can Keep Social Issues in the Public Eye

12/4/2017

By Laurie Trotta Valenti

A case study by the USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center’s Media Impact Project illustrates how one documentary series helped re-invigorate progressive groups following the 2016 elections, and may have lessons for media makers intent on social impact. The study of the EPIX series America Divided (which is available on Amazon and HULU) illustrates that documentarians can use innovative engagement campaigns to rally the public to action long after a program’s broadcast (if they were lucky enough to be broadcast!).

America Divided producers took 10 strategic steps to engage citizens following broadcast. Some of the steps were tried and true, such as using celebrity prestige to attract attention, but others were innovative, such as editing several shorter, single-issue versions of the series that could be screened before niche groups. This helped to build coalitions around the project as well as re-energize a demoralized liberal base following the 2016 elections.

The MIP study revealed that a key benefit was this re-invigoration of groups around the root causes of social injustice: the screenings and panel discussions gave activists a reason to assemble, to air their views and, more importantly, the paths to solutions. Specific actions that grew from these assemblages include canvassing, starting Social Media pages, creating petitions, signing-up for planned marches and rallies, as well as organizing additional meetings and screenings. The Case Study extracts 15 insights for media makers to create engagement around their work:

15 Tips for Media Makers to Keep Social Issues in the Public Eye
1. Think of broadcast as just the first step in your engagement campaign.
2. Forge partnerships with groups who can screen and promote your work. 
3. Seek connections between your issue and any arts, civic, philanthropy or cultural groups and their own activist work.
4. Focus screening campaigns around one rallying issue. 
5. Partner with regional PR firms that know the local players and issues and can unite disparate groups. 
6. Be open to re-purposing edits that allow for issue or region specific coalitions. 
7. Exploit celebrity power to cross-promote online, draw live audiences and create a relevant “face” for the issue. 
8. Use screenings as forums for people to assemble, discuss and create community. 
9. Engage audiences in panel discussions following screenings to promote deeper dialogue and create plans for social action. 
10. Support learning with fact-based resources for deeper study. 
11. Keep the momentum going by continuing to supply content to your partner groups. 
12. Reach out to different-minded audiences to promote civil discourse. 
13. Make the information in your documentary searchable online
14. Make certain screening partners can easily access your materials.
15. Keep your website current so that it becomes a source for news on your issues, and maintain ongoing dialogue with your digital audience.

Here is a full copy of the report; please contact us at if you would like to be added to our mailing list.

Assessing the impact of explanatory journalism

11/30/2017

by Anjanette Delgado,
Guest Blogger for MIP

Journalists don't as a rule, have a specific impact in mind when we begin our journalism. We list project goals, but other than bringing awareness to an issue or event we do not identify what we’d like to see happen next.

This is a story about the one time we did.

Rockland County, just northwest of Manhattan, is one of New York’s fastest growing counties. Neighborhoods that used to feel suburban and bucolic now choke with high-density sprawl, multi-family homes rise in backyards next door, traffic is a problem and religious schools pop up on residential streets.

“A generation ago, there were few problems between Ramapo's small ultra-religious Jewish communities and the gentiles and other Jews who made up the bulk of the town's population. Things have changed. As the ultra-religious community has grown, Ramapo has become a flashpoint in a continuing conflict over what it means to live in the suburbs. … The conditions fueling that conflict are now threatening to spread beyond Ramapo's borders. Surrounding communities have taken notice, and they are adopting measures aimed at heading off the strife that has become the norm for their municipal neighbor. No place, it seems, wants to become ‘the next Ramapo.’”

People in Rockland County, one of two counties we cover at The Journal News and lohud.com, argue over this. Things get ugly. Reader comments with the stories we write turn hostile and border on anti-Semitism. No matter what the topic, the conversation inevitably devolves into “us” vs. “them.”

But here’s the real problem, and it’s not religion: Ramapo’s loose zoning, lax enforcement of fire and building codes and largely unchecked development puts everyone at risk.

We wanted to know: Do people understand what’s really happening in Ramapo? If we were to explain the issue — lay it out in longform story, year by year and decision by decision — could we all (or most of us) finally agree? Could we change minds? If we could achieve consensus, would we stop arguing religion and start attacking the real problems?

So, after years of having the same tired, angry, circular discussion, we set out — in one project — to change the conversation.

We researched the story over several months. We talked to longtime residents, members of the Jewish community, government officials and the county’s Fire and Emergency Services coordinator. We wrote and rewrote, shot video and mapped the region.

“Ramapo nears breaking point” is a longform piece of explanatory journalism that laid out all of the problems that began decades ago.

Survey methodology

At the end of our story, we included a short survey to measure the impact of our
explanatory journalism — to find out if we successfully proved that the issues in Ramapo are a lack of zoning and safety code enforcement, not religion. (We considered asking for opinion at the beginning of the story to gauge change at the end, but felt that would inhibit readership and we could accomplish what we needed with one survey at the end.)

The survey was four questions, beginning with two easy Likert Scale queries:

How strongly do you agree that the issues in Ramapo are a lack of zoning and safety code enforcement, not religion?
How strongly do you agree that after having read this story, your opinion of the issues in Ramapo has changed?

Then we expected a steep drop-off in answers to the final two questions because the first takes time and the second raises privacy concerns:

How have Ramapo’s issues impacted you?
What is your email address?

We built the survey using PollDaddy because it prevents repeat responses and for the data it provides on the back end, including geolocation, a time/date stamp and referrer, and it assigns each respondent a unique PollDaddy ID. This helped us connect their answers from question 1 to question 2, and so on, and get a more complete picture of their response.

We embedded the survey at the bottom of the longform story. For two days, that was the only place you could find the survey; we didn’t embed it elsewhere or share it on social media. After two days we added it to our editorial, “Ramapo’s shoddy governance is by design.”

Survey results

Surprisingly, nearly 900 people responded. Here’s what they said:

Do people understand what’s really happening in Ramapo? Yes. Most (67%) either agreed or strongly agreed with our explanation of the issues, with “strongly agree” ranking the highest (54%).

Could we change minds? Yes. Of those 67%, 14% said our reporting convinced them, while 35% said they agreed beforehand.

Finally, we believed we and the community could stop having the same conversation and instead move forward toward solutions.

Emails. Almost a third — 29% — gave us their email address for follow-up.

Sources and commentary. Even more surprising than the total number of respondents was the percentage of them — 38% — who also took the time to write about how Ramapo’s issues have impacted them. Hearing from homeowners, those who’ve moved away, educators, fire safety officials, people who have tried to move in but claim to have been denied housing gave us a list of future story ideas and sources.

A few wrote to thank us for our reporting, for exposing the issues and doing so in such an
unbiased way. A couple said we should have written this years ago. One called it “conversation-framing analysis” and others called for more discussion on the topic. One response shows how we raised awareness and encouraged civic involvement:

“I live in a neighboring town and am concerned about Ramapo’s issues becoming issues here, too. So I will be paying more attention and doing what I can to ensure that we do not fall victim to the same lack of zoning and code enforcement that has plagued Ramapo.”

What we learned

People will answer a survey, even at the bottom of a longform story, if they’re invested enough in the issue.
Think about who you want to answer the survey and who you don’t. Burying our survey at the bottom of the longform story and not promoting it weeded out casual readers that we didn’t want filling it out anyway.
Close the feedback loop. Thank your readers and share the results of the survey. We didn’t do this at first, and our audience let us know that wasn’t OK.
Be upfront about how you’ll use their specific information. Unless you’re clear you will use their comments in a follow-up story, contact people to ask permission before publishing their words. This demonstrates respect and encourages further engagement.
Use all of the information you gather to learn more about the audience. We cross-checked our survey email list with our subscriber lists and the list of those who attended our project discussion in person to see who we’d reached. We learned that we have room to grow our subscriber base in Rockland when we otherwise would have thought we were talking to existing subscribers.

Anjanette Delgado is the digital director and head of audience for lohud.com and poughkeepsiejournal.com, part of the USA Today Network. Email: adelgado@gannett.com, Twitter: @anjdelgado. Special thanks to Lindsay Green-Barber at the Center for Investigative Reporting, who helped with survey methodology.

Nine Key Ways Media Impact Evaluations Differ From Research Projects … And Why We Care

11/15/2017

Erica Watson-Currie, PhD: November 2017

At the Media Impact Project, our mission is to understand the effects of media on viewers. We also strive to apply acquired knowledge to projects that serve the social good, and to be a thought leader on research issues in our field. This means we assume two distinctly different roles: the “critical friend” of the evaluator and the impartiality of the researcher.

By evaluating the work of individual documentarians, journalists, and other media makers, we help find ways to improve engagement opportunities with audiences on a micro level. In studying the general effects of media on society, we contribute to the greater body of research on this topic that touches us all. These are important distinctions to make, as evaluations of specific programs or films provides us with information about the whats -- audience demographics and how audiences responded, what actions they took, and if their behaviors changed; research on that same show can help us to understand the whys of media impact -- what was it about the program that sparked the response, spurred the action, or shifted behaviors.

Myriad scholars have weighed in on the distinctions between evaluation and research. Michael Scriven's oft-referenced explanation of differences between the two disciplines posits that although both practices apply social science tools to conduct empirical investigations and analyze data, evaluators do so to assess value of what is being examined with an eye to whether predetermined standards are met. This, while researchers collect data to test hypotheses and reach conclusions based on "factual results." Into this fray we contribute our own nine distinctions as they relate to media evaluation projects and our overarching research program here at the USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center’s Media Impact Project.

Nine Key Differences Between Evaluation vs. Research

1. Value: Evaluation focuses on the effectiveness and/or value of a program, message campaign, or other communications; Research strives to be value-free or at least value-neutral in pursuit of increasing knowledge.

2. Role: Evaluators work with stakeholders to understand a program's objectives and goals, and develop agreements on the relevant (and obtainable) "Key Performance Indicators" which constitute evidence these are being achieved. Researchers develop an initial question and design their study (e.g., intervention, experiment) deciding:
what variables will be tested; on whom; under what conditions; over what period of time.

3. Application of Critical Thinking Skills: Evaluators engage as a "critical friend" to program leaders helping to understand analyses, determine effective changes, and refine data collection as the program evolves (a posteriori/ad hoc). Researchers engage in critical thinking at outset of a study to implement procedures which prevent them from biasing data collection or interpretation of findings (a priori).

4. Use and Timing of Operationalization: Evaluators work with project leaders to operationalize terms and agree upon methods at outset of project; however, these may shift, expand, or evolve along with the project. Thus, the process of evaluation is responsive and incorporative of what is learned along the way. Researchers operationalize variables and set methods and procedures at the outset which are to be followed until project is completed.

5. Role in Avoiding Potential Pitfalls: External evaluators may be better positioned to recognize barriers and threats to a program's success, as well as unintended effects. Thus, evaluators often play a role in mediating collaborations between program leaders and key stakeholders to increase effective participation and encourage development of effective procedures. Researchers strive to be mindful of the possibility confounding variables may affect their results in order to exclude or control for these at the outset, or statistically eliminate their effects in analysis.

6. Review of Academic Literature: In Evaluation, purposes for literature reviews vary depending upon stage of program:

Front end and developmental - Evaluator may review literature on behalf of non-academic/applied program leader to suggest best practices for design
Formative - Review literature in light of findings to investigate probable causes for initial findings in order to make recommendations for modifying procedures, adapting materials, improving effectiveness
Summative - Search literature to make sense of unintended effects of program and unanticipated findings
In Research it is customary to primarily review relevant academic literature when proposing the study in order to formulate hypotheses and ways of testing.

7. Purposes and Procedures: Evaluations are conducted to discover strategies and tactics to improve a program. Thus, Evaluation Reports are provided at regular intervals as part of an ongoing process in order to encourage reflection and stimulate discussion among project leaders and key stakeholders to help discover and implement effective adjustments to materials and procedures (e.g., to enhance innovations) while the program is underway. Research seeks evidence to prove a program had the hypothesized effect and/or support a theory, with data analyzed and findings reported in full at the end of the study. Researchers would require approval from an Institutional Review Board to make substantial procedural changes to a research plan while in progress.

8. Dissemination of Findings: Evaluators report findings to program leaders and stakeholders to: provide a record of how the program developed and evolved over time
document programs' effects; help articulate best practices for institutionalizing a program and/or implementing it more widely. Researchers disseminate new knowledge for peer review as a contribution to an ongoing academic narrative.

9. Tables, Charts, and Graphs: Evaluators often get to use more engaging quantitative and qualitative data visualization techniques in reports to clients than permitted in academic journals. Research is reported in academic journals which often limit the permitted number of tables and figures, and most often display only black-and-white or grayscale images.

Thus, at MIP, our evaluations of entertainment projects, documentaries, films and other programs function as a vital component within our overall research mission to study the influence of news and entertainment on viewers. In my next blog, I will discuss how our evaluations of news and entertainment programs play an important role within our research.

One Weapon Against Fake News: More Media Literate Consumers!

10/31/2017

By Laurie Trotta Valenti, PhD
Last fall, a study from Stanford University found that many teenagers had trouble understanding what was and was not accurate or reliable information online. An earlier CDC study found that ½ of Americans thought medical information on fictional TV shows was accurate… while ¼ said television was a primary source of health information. In our world of fake news and questionable data sources, there is a sane, thoughtful and urgent solution that I want to shout from the rooftops. Here it is: We need to CULTIVATE MEDIA LITERACY!!!

What’s media literacy? Sadly, not everyone is familiar with the term. Media literacy teaches us to critique media as we would any form of data. It urges us to be active, as opposed to passive consumers, using our analytical skills to consider the commercial, social and cultural messages embedded in, say, your favorite sit-com or Facebook post. What techniques did a filmmaker use to manipulate you into crying or feeling terrified over that last scene? What subtle messages about race, class and world view were hidden? These are questions that are helpful to ask as we face bogus news sources, inaccurate information or stereotypical depictions onscreen.

Media literacy does not promote censorship, but informed viewership. Its tenets include fostering digital citizenship; they imply a knowledge of and some mastery of media creation. Thus, in a utopian media literate society, all consumers of media would be aware of its manipulative powers, critical of what they view, and empowered to be contributing members of the media landscape.

At the Media Impact Project, one facet of our mission is to measure the effects of media on consumers. The pedagogical field of Media Literacy is a relatively new one, and although some studies have attempted to measure the success of student learning, much more evaluation work needs to be done. A study I conducted with students at Arizona State University revealed that 50% of film production students who took a class on social issues in entertainment felt the course changed their thinking about media violence, and an astounding more than 90% said the course introduced concepts they would use throughout their media careers. Other studies indicate that just one media literacy course can open new levels of criticality surrounding media.

The National Association of Media Literacy Educators, or NAMLE, is sponsoring the 3rd Annual Media Literacy Week November 6-10, a time when educators across the country spotlight these concepts through a series of events. I urge you to consider participating. Enjoy some entertainment and then take some time to look under the hood at the influences that drive your own favorite show, or your children’s favorite shows… and then, if the spirit moves you, work within your own communities to foster a media literate approach to all you consume.
@medialiteracyed. #medialitwk
https://twitter.com/MediaLiteracyEd
https://www.facebook.com/MediaLiteracyEd
www.medialiteracyweek.us
www.namle.net

Tracking Real World Changes Inspired by Story

10/17/2017

By Anjanette Delgado

Measuring the audience response to a journalistic story usually means counting page views and unique visitors, yet that assessment falls short.

At my Gannett newspaper in Westchester County, we wanted to know more: What happened when we started asking questions (about a story)? After we published a story? When a key decision-maker or a crowd of people saw that story?

Did we spark a change in law, a donation, a citation or the dismissal of an unlawful employee? Did the family who lost their father’s Purple Heart years ago finally find it, with help from the crowd? Did we make a difference?

If you’ve arrived at this post, I probably don’t need to say that journalism matters. For many of us, it’s a calling and a purpose and so on. But while print newsrooms especially have been hesitant to talk about this lest we seem boastful, we need to drop the pretense and get comfortable reminding our readers, advertisers and subscribers of the impact we have on our communities — that is, if we wish to hold onto our relevance and our institutional heft.

That’s why we at The Journal News and lohud.com (Westchester County, New York) built an impact tracker — to record not the clicks but the real-world change our journalism inspires.

The tracker primarily serves, but is not limited to, two types of journalism: explanatory and investigative. Whereas the purpose of explanatory journalism is to make something clear (improve understanding, change minds), the purpose of investigative journalism is most often to reveal the secrets held close by those in power.

Documenting the impact of this journalism requires diligence and truthfulness on the part of the reporter; he or she must be able to prove, to a reasonable degree, that the change is the result of his or her work and not coincidence. It also requires time. The impact of a story might not be felt for months or years (for example, if a law is to be changed).

Do it well, though, and you will have information like this at the ready:

“The Pelham Manor Board of Trustees initially suspended Alfred Mosiello over racist emails he had forwarded. But within days of our revealing some of the emails, the board pressured him to retire.”

“The story led to Libby Pataki's resignation as tourism director, the dissolution of one nonprofit, and the reconstituting of another, with a proper board of directors and appropriate oversight.”

“After the story was published, the Federal Railroad Administration announced that it was considering a rule change that would limit the amount of hours track workers are allowed to put in during a day.”

“In response to a lawsuit seeking to improve secular education in some Hasidic yeshivas, Assemblyman Kenneth Zebrowski, D-New City, crafted a bill that allows the state to enforce the legal standard of ‘substantial equivalence.’ The lawyer who filed that suit credited our coverage with emboldening plaintiffs to come forward with the complaint.”

“Our reporting and outreach to U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer's office led to the Purple Heart being returned to the family of the World War II soldier and POW."

Underneath the hood

The tracker is a Ruby on Rails web application developed by Avram Billig to populate a database. Journalists manually add impacts and tie them to stories, and we can then filter and view by story, author, date, impact, etc. As reporters from multiple newsrooms add their work, it gets categorized and stored in a PostGreSQL database that we query to discover the analytics of impact over time.

Why we aren’t focusing on social media data

Many news organizations and foundations studying impact rightly track social media shares and influence as well to prove reach and influence, often, or money well spent. While our tracker includes an option to explain the social media impact, we chose not to put our focus there for two reasons:

We have other tools that are much better at that than we can be (CrowdTangle, Facebook Insights and Twitter Analytics, to name a few). We use those in concert with the tracker to see a fuller picture of what’s happened with our stories.
You get what you measure, and we’re simply more interested in inspiring real-world change.

What’s next

We started the tracker two years ago as a Google Form because it was simple to spin up and revise as we learned more about impact tracking and how it can help our newsroom. (Much credit for inspiring this first version goes to the wise and thoughtful Lindsay Green-Barber at the Center for Investigative Reporting.) Version 2.0 is this software we’re sharing with other USA Today Network newsrooms, and we’re beginning to think about 3.0 features such as connecting impact to traditional analytics and data visualizations. Each iteration of the software is a chance for greater understanding.

How we use the information we collect

In columns, letters and speeches explaining the ways we’ve inspired change.

For contest entries in which impact is a requirement.
To add to our understanding of audiences and what moves them to action.
And finally, an area we’d like to explore: In promotional and sales materials encouraging support for our journalism.

Questions about the tracker or how we’re studying impact?
Email: adelgado@gannett.com or Twitter: @anjdelgado.

Avram Billig turned my visions for the tracker into reality and is the reason reporters and editors think this is all much easier than it really is. Twitter: @aabillig.

Traci Bauer gave us the support and freedom to develop the tracker, and she helped shape many of its features. She is the vice president/news for The Journal News/lohud.com and The Poughkeepsie Journal. She believes empowering a community with strong journalism is the best way to build loyalty among audiences, and tracking their actions helps measure our own success. Email: tbauer@gannett.com, Twitter: @tbauer.

Anjanette Delgado is the digital director and head of audience for lohud.com and poughkeepsiejournal.com. Email: adelgado@gannett.com, Twitter: @anjdelgado.

Celebrating the Impact of Healthy Media Depictions

10/3/2017

This Is Us producer Vera Herbert was
among those celebrating healthy
storylines during the Sentinel Awards. Photo by Howard Pasamanick

By Laurie Trotta Valenti, PhD

On September 27 in Los Angeles, I had the pleasure of attending the Sentinel Awards, an annual celebration of television programs that entertain millions but also help viewers gain insights into serious health and social issues. These are popular shows that we (or some subset of we) love watching, shows whose writers artfully weave factual information into compelling storylines. The awards are sponsored by our Hollywood, Health & Society colleagues at the USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center. Categories include documentaries, talk shows, comedies, reality shows, children’s programming and dramas.

Highlights among the evening’s celebrity guests was Grey’s Anatomy (ABC) star Kelly McCreary, who spoke eloquently about learning of the rare type of breast cancer to which her character’s mother succumbed. Grey’s Producer Bill Harper, upon accepting the award, shared that a personal friend had pursued medical treatment after watching the storyline, which resulted in her receiving early, life-saving intervention.

Vera Herbert from the hit show This Is Us (NBC) accepted a Sentinel Award for a riveting plotline dealing with mental health issues, specifically panic attacks. Also celebrated were stories that made us laugh while informing, as awardee Laura Gutin Peterson from black-ish (ABC) accepted for the show’s exploration of preeclampsia among pregnant women. The unscripted series Born This Way (A&E) received an award for documenting the lives of teens with Down syndrome; and a story around the new Sesame Street (HBO) character Julia, who is diagnosed with autism, was celebrated as providing a tool for modeling social behavior among children.

Years of research in the social sciences tells us that children imitate behavior they see onscreen. We also know viewers gain medical knowledge from stories they see on television: a recent Pew report revealed that 83% of Hispanics studied received medical information from media. A study by the Lear Center’s Hollywood, Health & Society about a transgender storyline on the show Royal Pains revealed that the more shows with transgender characters viewers saw, the more positive their attitudes toward transgender people and policies were. In the case of Sesame Street, the “neuronormal” characters were helped to understand that a new friend’s seemingly eccentric behavior was due to her autism. How many children watching this show will now feel more comfortable interacting with an autistic classmate? In the case of Grey’s Anatomy, we know that at least one woman’s life was saved due to the information gleaned from the show. How many more viewers might these health and issue-oriented storylines impact?

Here at the Media Impact Project, we spend our days considering ways to measure precisely how a television show, a video experience, a game, a movie or a news series impacts audiences. We ask such questions as: What information did viewers learn and apply to their own lives after watching? Did people take action after viewing? Which storylines spur more viewers to take actions such as seeking medical treatment, or “liking” a story on a Facebook page, or signing-up to volunteer for a cause, or donating money? Answers to these questions could help writers, directors and producers create more meaningful stories that truly engage their audiences, and could assist anyone interested in media’s role in our lives gain more nuanced understanding of the issues. In future blogs, myself and my colleagues on the MIP team will be sharing insights on our projects and our methods to quantify media’s impact on viewers. Stay tuned!

The 2017 Sentinel Awards honorees:
Drama

Grey’s Anatomy—Maggie’s Mom storyline (ABC) Topic: Inflammatory breast cancer
This Is Us—Jack Pearson’s Son (NBC) Topic: Mental health

Comedy

black-ish—Sprinkles (ABC) Topic: Preeclampsia
You’re the Worst—Twenty-Two (FX) Topic: PTSD

Children’s Programming

Sesame Street—Meet Julia (HBO) Topic: Autism

Documentary

Audrie & Daisy (Netflix) Topic: Sexual assault
Gender Revolution: A Journey With Katie Couric (National Geographic) Topic: Gender identity

Short Documentary

Open Your Eyes (HBO) Topic: Eye health
Extremis (Netflix) Topic: End-of-life care

Talk Show

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver—Episode 86 (HBO) Topic: Opioid abuse

Unscripted Series

Born This Way—Dream Come True (A&E) Topic: Down syndrome

A Tale of Two Portrayals: Suicide and Eating Disorders on Netflix

8/11/2017

By Laurie Trotta Valenti

Two recent projects by Netflix, 13 Reasons Why and To the Bone, have attracted attention among public health officials for their portrayals of serious issues – rape, suicide and eating disorders.

13 Reasons is based on the popular novel by Jay Asher and involves a teen who commits suicide (in a heart-wrenching, four-minute wrist-cutting scene) after sending cassette tapes to 13 people she "blames” for her troubled life. The film has come under fire for what critics say are depictions of youth suicide and rape in graphic ways that could influence vulnerable teens. A study last week in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine reports there were between 900,000 and 1.5 million more suicide-related searches overall in the 19 days after the show's release than would normally be expected during the same period—many of them searching for information about suicide methods.

To the Bone delves into the world of anorexia. It is a semi-autobiographical account of writer Marti Noxon’s battle with the eating disorder as a teen. The leading actress Lilly Collins lost 20 pounds to prepare for the role, and has openly discussed and written about her own battle with an eating disorder. Some health experts voiced concern for the actress and the possibility of the experience triggering a relapse for her, and others commented that the real horrors of the disease were not shown in enough graphic detail.

But in comparison to 13 Reasons, this film was more widely acclaimed for portraying a nuanced look at the underlying issues of eating disorders and raising awareness. Further, the creative team involved consulted with other survivors as well as public health groups such as Project Heal, and were able to weave some educational messages into the script. Project Heal offers a To the Bone advice and discussion guide for viewers who want to explore the issues in the film.

Producers and writers of both projects stand by their choices. Both projects creative teams appear committed to exploring their respective issues, and they did so in ways that only could be done through narrative storytelling – placing us inside the minds and bodies of two young women and helping audiences to experience their pain. Both teams sought to tell serious and important stories and both wanted their projects to start a dialogue about subjects often seen as taboo. For this they should be commended, as should Netflix, for taking on this subject matter.

And yet, 13 Reasons producers seemed surprised by the outcries from public health community after the series aired. Their vision was to show the brutal gory truth of what a real suicide looks like, believing this would act as a deterrent to teens. They seemed unaware of the research that shows suicide portrayals statistically can lead to copycat suicides or contagion among teens, a group particularly likely to experience suicidal thoughts. Producers responded to criticisms by adding advisories and resource pages to their websites and to their films. They sponsored 13ReasonsWhy.info as a global resource center for people seeking help or information. But this backtracking could have been avoided if the producers had thought more deeply about the influence their series could have on their young audiences. Their creation amounts to more than telling a compelling story – they offer a glimpse into attitudes and actions that could be adapted – a “how-to” manual of sorts. To the Bone producers were more authentic in their presentation, but critics still felt the nature of the material could cause trigger behaviors.

These are dedicated creative professionals sharing meaningful stories… but in their roles as producers, writers, directors, casting and make-up professionals, the project teams failed to fully realize the POWER of their work to influence real behaviors in real life.

At the Lear Center’s Media Impact Project, we study the impact of news and entertainment on audiences. Our goal is to prove that media matters, and to improve the quality of media to serve the public good. The Lear Center’s Hollywood, Health and Society program offers free expert advice to entertainment industry professionals on a wealth of media issues from leading experts in health, public safety and security. We invite the creative community professionals telling stories with possible public health issues to contact us if they have any questions about the effects their work might have on viewers.

Filmmakers are the storytellers of our time… their work can easily reach millions of viewers. And here they have a challenge – recognizing that their stories have impact. They wield, in many ways, powerful force for emulating positive or negative behavior. They create, in fact, more than entertainment, more than a movie. For as Plato said, “Those who tell the stories rule society.”

Netflix added this resource page for crisis services after the broadcast of 13 Reasons Why spurred outcry from school counselors and suicide prevention organizations.

The Power of Media

8/3/2017

By Laurie Trotta Valenti, PhD

I believe in the power of media, for good or bad, and I’ve dedicated my career to getting people to think about how entertainment impacts us.

And what better place than the Norman Lear Center to look at these issues? I attended a TV Academy event a while back titled “An Evening With Norman Lear.” On the stage of the Montalban Theatre in downtown Los Angeles sat five talented and successful African American artists and executives from the hip-hop realm – Touré, Common, Steve Stoute, Russell Simmons and D-Nice. Each man reflected on how Norman Lear’s work on such shows as “The Jeffersons” and “Good Times” had influenced and helped shape them into the men they are today.

So many studies have documented the effects of media, particularly on young viewers, but nothing was more powerful than hearing someone like Russell Simmons, founder of Def Jam Recordings, talk about how he loved watching George Jefferson wearing a three piece suit and mouthing off to everybody in his high-rise building; and about how George Jefferson helped him realize that a powerful African American entrepreneur had something to say on American TV. Musician Common, who grew up in the same Cabrini-Green housing complex as the family portrayed on “Good Times,” reminisced about how the series told honest stories of life in the Chicago projects... it was an amazing evening that spoke to the heart.

I did not get the opportunity to discuss with Norman Lear his thoughts about that night, but it must have felt wonderful. He was getting first-hand knowledge of the profound positive impact his work had on real live people – successful people I might add.

But the majority of individuals who work in the entertainment industry seldom have the opportunity to hear how their work affects their audiences. Not just the high profile actors, writers and producers, but the many people who together help to create the films, TV shows, games and music videos we all consume every day.

If you’re say an editor working on low budget indie films, struggling to make the next mortgage payment, you are perhaps not thinking about how your edits affect viewers – you are just trying to tell your story… If you are a costume designer on a sitcom, or a casting director working under deadline pressure to find the perfect actor for a role, you perhaps are not considering the social stereotypes your choices may be planting in the minds of children watching your show… and yet, this work is affecting them.

Audiences are taking in all of the subtle social and cultural cues embedded in the stories we watch. Research shows that these choices made by our creative professionals do matter, as viewers model behaviors and attitudes and accept as normal what they see in the media.

My work in the past two decades has been to create awareness and dialogue among people in the creative community about the power of their work not simply to entertain, but to INFORM, and dare I say to INFLUENCE.

This is nothing new to Madison Avenue, which has been selling sugary cereal to kids for a long time now.

There have been many studies that explore the prosocial effects of positive role models as seen in entertainment characters.

Others explore the power of the narrative story lines to stimulate emotions, and how emotional responses influence learning and behavior.

Still others explore the negative influence of glamorizing violence or drug use to promote negative behaviors in viewers.

At the Lear Center’s Media Impact Project, we study the impact of news and entertainment on viewers. Our goal is to prove that media matters, and to improve the quality of media to serve the public good. This work has been my mission. I look forward to sharing with you in upcoming posts.

Based at USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center, the Media Impact Project provides insights into media’s influence on people's thoughts, attitudes, beliefs and actions. Our research illuminates the social impact of entertainment and news. We share our findings with those who can apply them to their own work: researchers, media makers and news organizations as well as the public.