Media And Crime

Question 1

Nonfictional and news representations

Answer 1

• Over-represents sexual and violent crime; Ditton and Duffy- 46% abt violent o sexual but made up 3% of police crime
• portray criminals and victims as older and more m/c; Felson- age fallacy
• exaggerates police success in clearing up cases (police as source of stories so trying to present in a good light)
• exaggerate risk of victimisation- especially to women, white people and higher status
• crime is reported as a series of separate events
• overplay extraordinary crime and underplay ordinary; Felson- dramatic fallacy and ingenuity fallacy (one has to be clever)

Question 2

Nonfictional and news representation- types of crime

Answer 2

• Schlesinger and Tumber; 60s focus was on murders and petty crimes, but by 90s focus was more on drugs, child abuse, terrorism and mugging
• Soothill and Walby; newspaper reporting of rape cases increased from under a quarter to over a third (focus on identifying a ex fiend or beast)

Question 3

Young

Answer 3

• news as a social construction, outcome of a social process where some potential stories are accepted/ rejected
• news values are criteria i which stories are manufactured, considering enough to make it into media;
  
  • immediacy
  • dramatisation (action/ excitement)
  • personalisation (human interest stories)
  • higher status person/ celebs
  • simplification
  • novelty/ unexpectedness
  • risk (victim centred stories)
  • violence (visual/ spectacular acts)

Question 4

Fictional representations of crime

Answer 4

• Surette; law of opposites- fictional media representations are opposite to official statistics;
• property crime as underrepresented while drug/ sex crimes are over represents
• fictional cops usually get their man
• fictional sex crimes committed by psychopathic strangers, not acquaintances
• real life homocides result from brawls/ domestic disputes, fictional from greed and calculation
• fictional villains tend to be higher status, m/c and white

Question 5

Media as cause of crime

Answer 5

• media as negative affects on attitudes, values and behaviours, especially to those more susceptible (young)—> blamed for moral decline eg rap lyrics and violent
  computer games like call of duty
• might create crime through;
  
  • imitation
  • arousal
  • desensitisation
  • transmitting knowledge of criminal techniques
  • as a target for crime
  • stimulation desires fo unaffordable goods
  • portraying police as incompetent
  • glamourising offending

Question 6

Fear of crime

Answer 6

• media exaggerates risk amount of violent/ unusual crime and risks of certain people becoming victime eg young, women and old people—> distorts publics impression of crime and causing unrealistic fear
• Gerbner et al; heavy users of television (over 4 hours a day) has higher levels of crime
• Sparks; media effects’ research often ignored the meanings viewers give to violence

Question 7

Media, relative deprivation and crime

Answer 7

• left realists- mass media help increase sense of relative deprivation amongst poor and marginalised social groups
• Lea and Young; media has standardised image of lifestyle for those who are unemployed or relying on benefits cannot afford- so accentuating sense of relative deprivation
• Merton; pressure to conform to norm can cause deviant behaviour when the opportunity to achieve by legitimate means is blocked (media instrumental in setting norms and promoting crime)

Question 8

Moral panics

Answer 8

• can cause crime through labelling- moral entrepreneurs will disprove of certain behaviours and successful campaigning will lead to action and law creation (condemns the group and its behaviour after media presents in a negative or stereotypical fashion)
• S. Cohen; folk devils and moral panics- studied societal reactions to disturbance between mods and rockers and media/ press exaggeration of events, prediction of future conflict were presented negatively ; produced deviance amplification an produced a self fulfilling prophecy in stigmatising the groups and polarising them

Question 9

Cyber crime

Answer 9

• Wall; new internet media has created a moral panic and fear over cyber crime- four categories;
• cyber trespass
• cyber deception and theft
• cyber pornography
• cyber violence
• policing cyber crime is difficult due to wide scale of the internet and limited policie resources allocated to it