I Guess This Is Really A "Chicken Or The Egg?" Type Thing...

[Lord Jim]

Watching 'Jersey Shore' might make you dumber, study suggests

By Melissa Dahl

Take note, fans of mindless reality shows like "Jersey Shore": New research suggests watching something dumb might make you dumber. In other words, you are what you watch.

It's called media priming -- the idea that the things we watch or listen to or read influence our emotions and our behavior, perhaps more than we realize. This particular study may be the first to use fictional characters in a narrative to show an effect on people's cognitive performance, says lead author Markus Appel, a psychologist at Austria's University of Linz.

In an experiment, volunteers were told to read a fake screenplay about a character they refer to as a "foolish soccer hooligan." (A subsequent finding of the study: Austrians are adorable.) The story describes a day in the life of a man named Meier: He wakes up, reads (and misunderstands) the message in an inspiration-of-the-day calendar, meets his friends in a bar and gets very drunk. Meier then goes to a soccer game, gets into a fight and comes home to crash; he sleeps through the next day. (Substitute the soccer game for a nightclub, and you have something very similar to the televised daily shenanigans of Snooki or The Situation.)

Some of the 81 volunteers were instructed to read a longer version of the "soccer hooligan" story, while others read a shorter version -- and the control group read a rather boring story in which Meier does nothing stupid. Then researchers gave the volunteers a multiple choice general knowledge test, including questions like, "What is the capital of Libya?" and "What kind of speed is expressed by the letter 'c' in physics?" and "Who painted La Guernica?"

To be fair, these are tough questions to answer sans-Internet regardless of whether you've just watched something vapid like "Toddlers and Tiaras." But, as the researchers write, "participants who read a narrative about a stupidly acting soccer hooligan performed worse in the knowledge test than participants who read a narrative about a character with no reference to his intellectual abilities.

"The present study is, to our knowledge, the first to show media priming effects of story characters on cognitive performance," they explain in the report, which was published online this month in the journal Media Psychology.

Think you're too smart to be influenced by the media you consume? That's cute. Anything we see -- a person on the street, an ad on TV, a character in a movie -- has some influence on our next thoughts, emotions or actions, simply because it's top of mind, says Joanne Cantor, a psychologist and member of the American Psychological Association who has studied the emotional and behavioral effect of TV and movies.

“What you’ve been thinking about recently or seeing recently (is) at a higher level in your consciousness, so your brain is kind of predisposed in that direction,” says Cantor, professor emerita of communication arts and outreach director center for communication research at the University of Wisonsin-Madison. “So if you’ve just seen a movie about really altruistic people and you get an opportunity to behave altruistically, you’ll probably do it, rather than if you’ve just seen a movie about selfish people." (So fans of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" aren't particularly charitable? Noted.)

Cantor explains that empathetic people are likely to be especially affected by media priming. [looks like I dodged the bullet] "But also, people who expose themselves to TV more are probably going to be more affected,” she says. Something to think about next time you find yourself lured into an hours-long marathon of your favorite reality show. On the other hand, some of us could likely use more gym and laundry, if not tanning, in our lives.

http://bodyodd.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011 ... 9k;twitter

[rubato]

"... In other words, you are what you watch.

It's called media priming -- the idea that the things we watch or listen to or read influence our emotions and our behavior, perhaps more than we realize. ... "

I believe this is absolutely true.

Filling your mind with crap gives you a crap mind. it is not avoidable.

Your brain is constantly working, building networks of associations and ideas and if you give it significant exposure to junk the mind you will have will be composed of junk.

yrs,
rubato

[dales]

GIGO

[Rick]

Dang, guess I'll have to quit visiting this place...

[@meric@nwom@n]

Sometimes you just want to be entertained.

There is nothing wrong with some junk food for the mind or the body.

No good will come from a steady diet of either.

[rubato]

Sometimes you just want to be entertained.

There is nothing wrong with some junk food for the mind or the body.

No good will come from a steady diet of either.

Could you justify listening to Rush Limbaugh or Anne Coulter that way? People who encourage lying and hatred?

Is there 'mental junk food' which is harmless, like a few french fries, and others with are per se harmful like cigarettes?

yrs,
rubato

[Rick]

Or peanuts!

Good night let's not forget peanuts...

[Lord Jim]

Of course the study offers a very easy solution to largely avoiding this problem....

Cantor explains that empathetic people are likely to be especially affected by media priming.

Just don't be empathetic....

The more misanthropic you are, the less likely you are to be affected.

[@meric@nwom@n]

Sometimes you just want to be entertained.

There is nothing wrong with some junk food for the mind or the body.

No good will come from a steady diet of either.

Could you justify listening to Rush Limbaugh or Anne Coulter that way? People who encourage lying and hatred?

Is there 'mental junk food' which is harmless, like a few french fries, and others with are per se harmful like cigarettes?

yrs,
rubato

It is always good to know what those you oppose are up to, no? To have a reasonable and informed opinion? Blind hate is stupid.

[Lord Jim]

Sometimes you just want to be entertained.

There is nothing wrong with some junk food for the mind or the body.

No good will come from a steady diet of either.

Could you justify listening to Rush Limbaugh or Anne Coulter that way? People who encourage lying and hatred?

Is there 'mental junk food' which is harmless, like a few french fries, and others with are per se harmful like cigarettes?

yrs,
rubato

It is always good to know what those you oppose are up to, no? To have a reasonable and informed opinion? Blind hate is stupid.

If being a misanthrope is the key to not being affected, good ol' rube is bullet proof....

[Andrew D]

One has to wonder what such a study would make of watching FOX.

[rubato]

Sometimes you just want to be entertained.

There is nothing wrong with some junk food for the mind or the body.

No good will come from a steady diet of either.

Could you justify listening to Rush Limbaugh or Anne Coulter that way? People who encourage lying and hatred?

Is there 'mental junk food' which is harmless, like a few french fries, and others with are per se harmful like cigarettes?

yrs,
rubato

It is always good to know what those you oppose are up to, no? To have a reasonable and informed opinion? Blind hate is stupid.

Habitual behavior is what I was talking about. One does not have to expose oneself to the nastiness of Limbaugh or Coulter habitually to have a well-informed view of them.

Much of the mindless right lives on inspiring hatred.

yrs,
rubato

[@meric@nwom@n]

I guess I have no idea why you addressed this at me since I suggested limitng junk intake.

Whatever one deems to be junk.

[rubato]

"It is always good to know what those you oppose are up to, no? To have a reasonable and informed opinion? Blind hate is stupid."

I was responding to this.

yrs,
rubato

[@meric@nwom@n]

And so?

[rubato]

And so?

read the above.

[@meric@nwom@n]

I did. If there is supposed to be some mystic message in it other than sentiment I already expressed I missed it.

[Sean]

Is there 'mental junk food' which is harmless, like a few french fries, and others with are per se harmful like cigarettes?

yrs,
rubato

Yes, eating cigarettes is harmful to your health.