MM100 Exam 3 - You are an expert on the media in general

MM100 Exam 3

Short Answer:

For each question below, answer the question in 1 or 2 sentences. These questions are worth 5 points each. THESE ARE NOT ESSAY QUESTIONS SO KEEP YOUR ANSWERS BRIEF AND GET STRAIGHT TO THE POINT.

1. You are an expert on the media in general and you teach media classes at a local university so people often turn to you for insights about issues or events in the media.

One morning, you learn that a group of teenage girls (Sarah, Jessica, Leslie and Kimberly, all age 12) who attended your town’s local middle school murdered one of their classmates (Jana, age 12) and then committed suicide together in the woods behind the middle school’s football field. The police determined that it was a murder-suicide based on the evidence left behind.

Everyone in your town is stunned. Who could ever believe that these girls would do such a terrible thing? The authorities begin to investigate these girls’ home lives and school lives to figure out the motive for such a thing. Police find all the girls had unrestricted access to Netflix and Sarah, Jessica, Leslie, and Kimberly had all watched adolescent TV shows such as Pretty Little Liars, Gossip Girl, and 13 Reasons Why. These girls had also been very active on social media and their Facebook profiles show many private messages back and forth among the group about their hatred for Jana. The authorities also discover several text messages from Sarah to Jana telling her things like “You should just die.” Upon investigating Sarah, Jessica, Leslie, and Kimberly’s online search histories, police also show that they looked up ways of committing suicide several times over the last few months.

The local newspaper editor believes there is an angle to investigate here about the media so he sends a reporter to interview you about the situation. The reporter says that local officials say that these girls were clearly socialized to model violent behavior because of the TV shows they watched. They want to pursue legal action to censor mature content for young adults and take Netflix to court because the media were clearly a bad influence on Sarah, Jessica, Leslie, and Kimberly.

You know such action is simplifying an extremely complex situation. Using social learning theory, how can you refute the claim that watching these TV shows made these girls kill their classmate and themselves? (Hint: there are 4 important steps in this theory that should be discussed in your answer)

2. Now, using the same scenario as in question 1, apply uses and gratifications theory to it. How can you persuade local officials not to ban teens from watching TV shows by explaining it with this theory?

3. The local newspaper has decided to now print a story using your explanation of social learning theory refuting that playing violent video games made Sarah, Jessica, Leslie, and Kimberly kill Jana and themselves. The story makes the local politicians look like idiots and, when the mayor hears about the story before it goes to press, he calls the local newspaper owner and tells him NOT to print the story or he’ll use his office to punish the newspaper. What legal concept applies in this situation and why would the mayor’s actions be considered illegal?

4. So, the local newspaper prints the story from question 3 and it undoubtedly makes the mayor look incompetent and ignorant even though every fact in the story is true. He gets angry and decides to sue the newspaper for libel. Walk me through what a libel case would look like in this situation. Answer these questions:

a. Is this a civil case or a criminal case?

b. Who is the plaintiff and who is the plaintiff (the person/entity suing) and who is the defendant (the person being sued)?

c. Who has the responsibility to prove that libel occurred (defendant or plaintiff)?

d. Is the plaintiff considered a public figure and why?

e. What are the three main elements that the person/entity responsible would have to prove?

f. Define actual malice and tell me why or why not this extra element would need to be proved in this instance.

g. At which element would the lawsuit fail and why?

5. Visit 5 major news organizations on the internet. You can choose from this list: The New York Times, The Washington Post, NBC, MSNBC, Fox News, Headline News, USA Today, Associate Press, BBC, The Guardian, Al Jazeera, ABC. Using 5 of these sites and the top headlines – tell me what the top two stories are for the day (mark down what date you visited in your answer and which sites you used). What predominant media theory does this illustrate and how do you know? (We talked about this in Ch 15 and Ch 8).

6. Your town has just elected a new mayor, Shelly Birdman, over her highly-publicized candidate Mike Wall. All the polls said that Mike would win and that he was showing 15% more votes than Shelly. Again, since you’re a media expert, local news stations ask you how this could be? Explain this phenomenon using the spiral of silence theory.

7. Your best friend, Sidney Jane, loves to watch Criminal Minds, Without a Trace, CSI, CSI Miami, CSI New York, NCIS, Law and Order, Bones, and Law and Order SVU. She typically watches 8 or 9 episodes per day and loves reruns.

You propose going on a trip together to New York City for spring break for fun. However, Sidney Jane says she is extremely afraid of becoming a victim of crime in NYC. You show her crime stats for NYC and talk about how low they are but Sidney Jane doesn’t believe you and refuses to go out of fear. What media theory that we learned applies to this situation and might explain Sidney Jane’s behavior and why?

8. John Smith, your roommate, will only watch Fox news for political updates. He swears that all the other news channels are biased. Furthermore, he listens to Hannity’s radio program and loves Rush Limbaugh because he is a conservative Republican. You try to explain to him that all news is biased up to a point because journalists are humans, but he swears his chosen media channels give the truth about what’s happening in the world. Furthermore, even though you show him clear proof that Rush Limbaugh gives only one side of the story, John dismisses your evidence and doesn’t even remember what you have said when he argues with you. What media theories/concepts might apply to this situation and how can you explain them using John’s behavior? You should come up with two (we talked about these two in Ch 1 and Ch 15.

9. Joe Smith is highly involved in drug trafficking with a local gang and he has ties to a South American cartel. However, Joe decides to get greedy and offs his drug-running gang pals with a machete one night when he’s high. Joe gets arrested and the media report on every detail of the case – from the drug trafficking to the machete. It’s sensational and so unusual that everyone in the local community is shocked.

Joe finally goes to trial and the media are following along closely to see what happens and to keep the community informed. What are the legal ramifications of such a highly-publicized trial? I want to see your answer include a discussion of the First and Sixth Amendments.

10. Why can the FCC regulate radio and TV broadcast so heavily when it comes to freedom of speech? (There’s more than one reason and you probably need to revisit the radio chapter to make sure you don’t miss the right answer.)

11. You now work for Proctor & Gamble, a large corporation that owns the product line of Dawn dish soap. Your company wants to introduce a new fragrance to the Dawn dish soap line called Raspberry Delight. Your boss tells you to create the best advertising message for this product. You immediately know it’s going to start with marketing research. How can you gather first-hand data to create a great advertising pitch? (I’m looking for a research method here and an explanation of how it works.)

12. Think about the CoverGirl makeup line. What is the target market for this product line? Now, look at the magazine ad on the next page with Katy Perry in it. Based on that ad, who is the target audience – explain the target audience by listing 2 demographics and 2 psychographics using evidence from the ad AND tell me WHY each demographic and psychographic is true.

13. Watch this AXE body spray commercial. Now, based upon what you saw, define the target audience with 3 demographics and 3 psychographics. Tell me why you picked each demographic and psychographic and why they are true based upon evidence from the commercial.

14. The VALS framework is often used to better understand consumers. If you were an advertiser and you were told to come up with the best target audience to sell an expensive Rolex watch to – where on the VALS framework would your ideal customer fall and WHY?

15. Watch this Allstate commercial. Now, tell me which strategy applies MOST to the commercial (i.e. bandwagon effect, myth analysis, snob appeal, fear appeal, irritation advertising, association principle) AND why.

16. Watch this Mr. Clean commercial and tell me which strategy applies MOST (i.e. bandwagon effect, myth analysis, snob appeal, fear appeal, irritation advertising, association principle) AND why.

17. Your company creates a new skincare product that significantly reduces facial acne, so much so that most test subjects showed clear skin in the first two weeks of the clinical trial. Your boss is very excited about this product and tells you to start working on the advertising message. He says that you should say that the product will eliminate all facial acne after using it just once. You tell your boss that legally, that will create problems and the government will step in. If you did say this about the skincare product in an ad, what would this be called and what would the FTC do? (Straight out of the book and ppt slides.)

18. We talked Washburn and the techniques the marketing department uses to recruit prospective students. Please name three ways in which we market to prospective students and explain why one of the three is effective.

19. Edward Bernays’ most famous campaign was called Torches of Freedom. I said this man was a genius at PR because in his Torches of Freedom campaign, what two things did he conflate (Hint: the answer has nothing to do with the color green)?

20. Define four stakeholders that Washburn University has and tell why they are.

21. Is Jerry Farley an opinion leader, a decision-maker or both? Explain why.

22. Using the relationship between the Coke Cola corporation and its vendors (stores that sell Coke products like gas stations), explain resource dependency theory.

23. What was BP’s CEO and United Airlines’ CEOs biggest mistakes and what should they have done after their respective crises?

24. Thinking back over all the critical thinking issues we have studied this semester, which one do you think is the biggest problem for the media and society and why?

25. Which chapter do you feel you learned the most from? List three main things that stuck out to you and tell me why they made such an impact.