Title
The King of Mental Manipulation: Effects of Media on Women's Mental Health
Files
Description
Terra Tonellato, COM450: Communication and Society
Faculty Mentor(s): Professor Michael Niman, Communication
The goal of this presentation is to provide an overview of adverse effects media has on women's mental health. Media has continuously fueled issues ranging from body image dissatisfaction, sexual assault, depression, anxiety, and antiquated gender roles, causing long term effects on the men and women who are exposed to them. This is a direct result of inaccurate representations of women, including increased sexualization, photoshopping imperfections, and emotionally manipulating women and men into thinking they need such qualities to feel wanted in society. The lack of diversity in advertisements demonstrates the corrupt goals of advertising and media, highlighting how the lack of advertising regulations have allowed the issue of mental manipulation to spiral out of control. Many studies documented in academic journals conclude that the media enforces toxic consumption habits, purposely manipulating women's self-esteem while simultaneously lifting men's expectations of gender privilege to new heights, increasing rape, sexual assault and harassment. The studies call for extreme and immediate change in order to spare future generations from this dangerous misogynistic advertising culture. The information in my presentation is supported by images of past and present ads and visual representations of statistics.
Publication Date
2021
Recommended Citation
Tonellato, Terra, "The King of Mental Manipulation: Effects of Media on Women's Mental Health" (2021). Communication and Humanities. 5.
https://digitalcommons.buffalostate.edu/srcc-sp21-commhum/5
