Reality Tv's Negative Effects On American Culture

In today’s society, reality television has become a staple in the homes of many average Americans and capitalizes in the television industry. In fact, according to anhoward.wordpress.com, in the average American home, reality television occupies about sixty-seven percent of television watched daily. What is it that draws viewers into watching these shows? How did they get to be so popular in American culture? In analyzing reality television in today’s society, it can be noted that although there are positive influences that reality TV can bring, the negatives such as promoting consumerism, materialism, unhealthy obsessions over appearance and creating negative para-social interactions, outweigh the positives.

When watching reality TV, many

A documentary called “Miss Representation” conducted a study with nearly one thousand one hundred teenagers. In this study they analyzed the link between teenagers and reality TV shows such as “Teen Mom”, “American Idol”, “The Bachelor”, “Project Runway” and “Jersey Shore”. Like mentioned in the previous paragraph, an important thing to note was that there were positive impacts made from these shows. For example, “Teen Mom” and “American Idol” were motivational, insightful, and raised awareness on social issues. However, the negative impact of these shows was more profound in this study. After watching these shows the teenagers could conclude that they felt more aggressive and experienced some form of bullying from others in their life, which is a major problem that reality television promotes. Also, these teenagers noted that they too worry about their physical appearance immensely when facing others in society. Unknowingly, about seventy five percent of these young adults believed that these types of TV shows were based on real events and were completely unscripted. In all reality, these television shows impact young females more than they do males. This is due to the stigma that sex sells. The writer and producer of “Miss Representation”, Jennifer Siebel Newman states, "The reality shows that demean women, or where they 're obsessed with beauty, or obsessed with finding a man ... it further encourages a culture that causes women to self-objectify, and for men to see women as second-class." She also states that in a culture that is purely obsessed with beauty and drama, these TV shows only put down women and glorify others such as the Kardashians which then creates a double standard in our society. The biggest misconception in all of this is that