Examining the Evidence: Portrayals of the Careers in Criminal Minds

Within the fields of forensics and criminal justice there is the hot topic of crime show representations and their accuracies/inaccuracies. Some people owe these shows for exposing the career choice to them while others within the field blame these shows for common misconceptions about their career. This study utilizes the research done concerning the two main theories that apply to crime show effects: the cultivation theory and the CSI Effect. By examining the current research, a new study was conducted to further confirm or deny the claims made by both theories which aim to say that these crime shows are impacting people’s perceptions of what is often depicted. To accomplish this, a content analysis was done over the popular crime drama Criminal Minds. The evidence collected agreed with most of the ideas that research surrounding the CSI Effect has described. There was a great disparity in the type of evidence shown and which ones had positive or negative representations which in turn can cause people to have unrealistic expectations of evidence within the courtroom. This evidence disparity also supported the idea that rather than simply being coined the ‘CSI Effect’ a better name may be the ‘tech effect’. In addition, the occupations represented throughout Criminal Minds were mostly positive and could account for students’ motivations to enroll in certain majors and careers. More research still needs to be done but it is clear that the depictions within crime shows have the ability to influence people’s views of criminal investigations

THE INFLUENCE OF VIEWING MEDICAL DRAMAS ON ACCEPTANCE OF COMMERCIAL UNMANNED AERIAL SYSTEMS FOR MEDICAL FLUID TRANSPORTATION

This study evaluated the influence of viewing medical dramas on participants’ acceptance of drone use for medical fluid transport. Participants were 199 individuals ages 18 and over recruited via Survey Monkey Audience. Participants responded to an online survey about their attitudes towards drone use for medical fluid transportation and their television viewing activity. The survey tested the ability of medical dramas to cultivate and develop mainstream attitudes towards drone use for medical fluid transport. Results found that attitudes towards medical fluid transporting drones were not susceptible to cultivation or mainstreaming effects simply due to medical drama viewership. A discussion of these results as well as directions for future research are offered

Subjective Excess: Aesthetics, Character, and Non-Normative Perspectives in Serial Television After 2000

This dissertation aims to fill gaps in contemporary television scholarship with regards to aesthetics and character subjectivity. By analyzing eight series that have all aired after 2000, there is a marked trend in series that use an excessive visual and aural style to not only differentiate themselves from other programming, but also to explore non-normative perspectives. Now more willing to explore previously taboo topics such as mental health, addiction, illness, and trauma, the shows featured in this dissertation show how a seemingly excessive televisual aesthetic works with television’s seriality to create narrative complexity and generate character development. Chapters are arranged by mode of production with the first chapter focusing on the series Grey’s Anatomy and Hannibal as a means of exploring the production and distribution practices surrounding network TV. The second chapter examines the basic cable series Crazy Ex-Girlfriend and Legion and posits how the narrowcasting of cable allows for more nuanced character representations through aesthetics. In the third chapter, the impact HBO has had on the television medium is explored through Carnivàle and Euphoria. The final chapter looks at contemporary series The Boys and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt as a way to better understand how the medium’s production and distribution has shifted during the convergence era. Ultimately, this dissertation will argue that in addition to further explorations of aesthetics, television studies is in need of a medium specific vernacular for creating meaningful textual analyses that avoid an overreliance on cinematic terminology

Source of Expertise Affects Perceived Credibility of an Interview Used in a Medical Documentary

This thesis is composed of two integrated components: a creative project and original academic research. The creative component is a 25-minute medical documentary called Fairy Steps. Fairy Steps follows a 4-year-old girl with Cerebral Palsy who is trying to get to St Louis, in America to have a surgery called Selective Dorsal Rhizotomy (SDR) that may help her walk for the first time. There were difficulties finding New Zealand health professionals willing to be interviewed for Fairy Steps but a timely holiday visit to New Zealand provided an opportunity to film the American surgeon. The challenge of finding experts willing to be interviewed and a paucity of research into credibility of different sources of expertise provided the impetus for the academic research. The academic component involved original research into the use of interviews in Fairy Steps, and how this storytelling device affects viewers’ perceptions of source credibility, empathy towards the characters and engagement with the content. This was tested with an intervention where 328 individuals were divided into two conditions. Each was shown one of two 30-second videos. The video was an excerpt from Fairy Steps; the same individual was shown in both videos in which the condition of Cerebral Palsy was briefly, accurately and articulately described. In one condition, the interviewee was labelled correctly as the mother of a child with the condition of Cerebral Palsy; in the other condition, the interviewee was labelled as a neuroscientist. Both labels were deemed plausible in pilot testing. Measures of viewer perceived credibility, empathy and engagement were assessed by pre-test and post-test survey questions in each group and compared between conditions. There were no differences in viewer engagement or empathy between the conditions. There was a significant difference in participant responses to two of the credibility questions, regarding the interviewees’ experience and expertise. Participants were more likely to “Strongly agree” that the Mother had more experience. Participants were comparatively more firm in their belief that the Scientist was an expert in Cerebral Palsy than the Mother. This research has implications for the use of interviews for factual communication. Viewers are frequently using media as a source of learning about health-related information. The current research has indicated that source identity has effects on viewer perceptions of source credibility. Source credibility is essential to viewers making well informed decisions about their health. Given this, this research indicates that the choice of expert can impact how effective the message is in a documentary and have wider consequences for the viewer. As such when using this medium for health communication it is crucial that filmmakers think about who is the most appropriate expert to effectively communicate their message and whether this expert should necessarily be a Health Professional

Television's Cultivation of Attitudes about Online Romantic Relationships

Cultivation theory is based upon the idea that television depicts a world that is different from people’s social reality. The result is that people who watch a lot of television have an inaccurate and skewed perception of the real world (Gerbner, 1969). The primary focus of Gerbner's work has been on perceptions of societal violence. Cultivation has since explored other areas such as gender stereotyping (Signorielli, 1989, 1990), child socialization (Hawkins and Pingree, 1980), and environmental risks (Dahlstrom, 2010). The purpose of the current study is to assess how the consumption of television media messages predicts people’s ideas about online romantic relationships. The research found that consumption of television media messages predicts attitudes about online romantic relationships. The content analysis showed that there is not necessarily a consistent television message about online romantic relationships; however television advertising predicts attitudes about online romantic relationships. The survey results showed that television advertising predicts lower associations of stigma and higher associations of normalization for online romantic relationships. Most important towards the advance of cultivation theory is the study found that people who watch more television have more positive attitudes about online romantic relationships than people who watch less television. Expanded study of online romantic relationships as they continue to become more common is suggested as this research represents a first look at an important and underesearched area of media theory and interpersonal communication demonstrating a valued addition to the cultivation literature

Education movies and the promotion of one dimensional thinking: a marcusean examination of films made between 2005 and 2017

This thesis examines how recent movies have depicted schools and teachers in the United Kingdom and the United States. Deploying methodological tools outlined by the Frankfurt School critical theorist Herbert Marcuse, it analyses the messages of twenty-first century film-making in the school genre, asking whether such films reinforce or challenge neoliberal perspectives of education. To address this, ten films are assessed against Marcuse’s most significant and well-known philosophical concept - ‘one-dimensionality’ - modes of thinking in ‘advanced capitalist societies’ where critical spaces and alternative ways of seeing the world are closed down. To analyse whether films contribute to a ‘one-dimensional’ perspective of education, key Marcusean constructs are utilised, concepts that Marcuse argued contributed to the death of critical thinking. The films are analysed through the main written method of the Frankfurt School – the dialectic. Through the combined dialectical analysis of ten films, literature in the field and through exploration of critical theory and Marcuse, this thesis argues that movies play an important role in the consolidation of neoliberal perspectives of education, and that awareness and examination of the impact of popular culture should remain a significant feature of any critical society. In so doing, the thesis also aims to critically contribute towards a recent ‘renaissance’ in the consideration and application of Marcuse’s scholarly output