The Media as an Agent in Socialization

According to the reading, “Socialization and Culture” from the book “Interdisciplinary English” by Loretta F. Kasper, socialization is the process in which a child learns how to behave in life and participate in a group in society. Socialization has four basic agents: family, school, peers and the mass media. Each one of these agents plays a role in our lives. However, in my opinion, the most important agent of socialization for the development of the child is the mass media. The Mass Media are the different processes that facilitate communication between the sender of a message and the receiver of that message. It plays an important role in the socialization of children. In fact, there are many types of media; these include newspapers, magazines, radio, films, CDs, Internet, and television. These kinds of media, especially television, affect children’s and adult’s behavior in different ways. According to the article, “Socialization: From Infancy to Old Age”, “The average family in the United States has at least one television turned on for at least seven hours a day.” Television is the biggest mass media in this country and has positive and negative aspects. There are some programs which are very helpful with lots of information for the children. For example; on channel thirty-three, there is a good program called“Dora the explorer”. Children can learn to speak Spanish and also do things such as singing, standing up and pronouncing words in English. On the same channel, there is also a program called “Blue’s Clues”. In this program, children learn how to think, sing and discover clues. When children watch these programs, they are not the same people anymore because they can become more knowledgeable. These programs are very good because they change children’s minds and make the children different from what they