Visual Images in the Media

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Visual Images in the Media

John Huxford, School of Communication, Illinois State University, Normal, IL, USA

2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract

This article offers a review and assessment of the polemics surrounding the nature of the visual image (i.e., a reproducedsight) in the media (mass-produced communication), and of its social implications. The author explores the intellectual

history of the debate,which is most typically advanced as an opposition between the qualities and effects of the word, or text,

and of the image. The discussion is tracked across three key areas: child literacy and education, commercial and political

persuasion, and issues surrounding the news. It is also suggested that in an era when the image is seen to have gained

ascendency over text, digital tools and the power of the Internet bring potent new in uences on the way we create, consume,

and comprehend visual images.

The world is lled with visual images. Images appear on tele-

vision and movie screens, billboards, posters, magazines,

newspapers, and computer monitors. While, as a specic eld

of academic study and teaching, visual communication is little

more than 50 years old, the properties and impact of the visualimage have been the subject of research for centuries across

a range of academic disciplines. In recent years, the emphasis

has moved away from theories of art toward a psychosocial

perspective that draws on research from semiotics, branches of

psychology, sociology and communications, and cultural

theory.

In this article, the discussion will focus on three key areas:

child literacy and education, commercial and political persua-

sion, and issues surrounding news, as well as on the repercus-

sions of digital imagery and the way that the power of

cyberspace is changing the social role of visual communication.

The Age of the Image

Increasingly, it is argued that the word, once the dominant

medium, is being supplanted by the image. Civilization has

taken, in W.J.T Michell’s phrase, a ‘pictorial turn’ (Mitchell,

1994: pp. 2–3). As Kellner suggests: “ We are living in one of

the most articial visual and image-saturated cultures in

human history, which makes understanding the complex

construction and multiple social functions of visual imagery

more important than ever before” (2002: p. 81).

In earlier centuries, the balance between verbal and visual

representation strongly favored the word. Text dominated,

while images in books typically served in a subsidiary role as

illustrations. However, this status quo was challenged by the

emergence of the photographic process in the nineteenthcentury, with photographs then spreading into newspapers and

advertisements. Film accelerated the process with the devel-

opment of a series of audiovisual technologies, including

movies and television, tipping the balance between word and

image in favor of the latter.

Today digital imagery and streaming video in cyberspace

have added new dimensions to our ever-developing and

increasingly complex visual culture. Text and images interact in

new ways in the multimedia terrain of the Internet, reigniting

the long-standing debate over the properties and functions of

the visual versus those of the word.

Visual Images versus the Word

There has long been debate over the social implications of the

image. Often this has centered on controversies that surround

certain visual media; most prominently, racial and gender

stereotyping, sexually explicit material, and violence as depic-

ted on television, lm, the Web, and in video games. However,

this debate has also been advanced as an opposition between

the qualities and social effects of the word or text, and those of

the image, with the former typically being privileged over the

latter.

History of the Debate

Whichever medium may be the most ubiquitous, the premiseon which this debate turns has always been the supposed

superiority of text over image, a bias informed by an intellec-

tual tradition that stretches back centuries. (For a detailed

discussion, see Stephens, 1998.) The Bible, in associating the

Word with creation in Genesis while forbidding the production

of the ‘graven image or any likeness,’ has long been used to

support this presumption. Even as the image has established

itself at the center of Western culture, writers and philosophers

from Plato to contemporary thinkers have remained critical of

the qualities and effects of the image compared to those of

the word.

This intellectual antipathy is prompted by a series of over-

lapping concerns. Partly, it is founded on a long-standing

suspicion of verisimilitude. In one view, such a capturing of likeness evokes a high degree of ‘truth.’ It is this perspective that

typically reects a traditional, although now contested, history

of art as the progress of visual reproduction toward an ever

more accurate reection of the natural world, an ideal estab-

lished by the Romans, and one that nds its most perfect

expression in the photographic process.

However, verisimilitude has also driven a more negative

perspective; that what the visual image offers is not truth but

seductive illusion. A painter, Plato wrote, can deceive ‘ children

International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, 2nd edition, Volume 25 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.95041-4 169

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and fools’ with the ‘imitation of appearance,’ instead of

bringing ‘truth’ or ‘real things’ (1956: p. 463). Substantively,

this argument remains the root of one strain of criticism laid

against television and movies, that their illusionary realism

may offer an ideal vehicle for propaganda.

A second charge leveled against the visual image is that, with

the growth of technical reproduction, images devalue the

objects they represent. The uniqueness of the original is lost in

the deluge of visual copies. This argument is perhaps most acute when what is being reproduced are images of cherished

buildings, statues and landmarks, and most especially, works

of art. When the Mona Lisa becomes a common sight in the

everyday world beyond the louver – for example, on T-shirts

and advertising hoardings – the ‘quality of its presence,’

in the words of Walter Benjamin, is “always depreciated”

(1969: p. 221).

A third charge involves the long-held belief that the

image speaks more directly to the emotions than to

the logical mind. Aquinas argued that images “excite the

emotions more effectively aroused by things seen than by

things heard” (cited in Freedberg, 1989: p. 162). This rousing

of emotions is seen as making the problems surrounding

pornography and the visual depiction of violence all themore acute.

Finally, the image’s accessibility may distract the populace

from the more cerebral merits of the word, be it the religious

tract, improving essay, or newspaper text.

Visual Images and Child Literacy

If there is unease that the image is replacing the word for society

in general, this concern is heightened in debates over child

literacy. At different times, anxiety has centered on the

presumed ill effects on children’s reading abilities and habits of

a series of visual media, including movies, comic books, and

video games. However, most commonly criticized is television.Researchers have offered a number of hypotheses concerning

the effects of television on child literacy and weighed the

empirical evidence for each.

A stimulation hypothesis argues that there is no conict

between images on television and words in print because

watching television stimulates or improves reading in the

young. This theory, although not widely held, rests largely on

studies concerned with the reading of a book based on a tele-

vision show after watching the program, or more generally, on

children being prompted by television to research an interest.

However, in a study of the juvenile book market, only a small

percentage of children reported reading a book after seeing or

hearing of it through television. Similarly, the ndings from

other studies imply that any interests that are aroused by television tend to be short-lived.

More systematically studied are variations of a reduction

hypothesis, where the consumption of television is predicted to

have a negative impact on reading. There are ve common

variations of this hypothesis. First, a displacement hypothesis

argues that television viewing takes time away from reading.

However, studies have shown no conclusive evidence of this,

indicating instead that time given to reading, although always

scant, has remained remarkably stable.

Second, the passivity hypothesis argues that television

viewing causes children to become mentally indolent and so

less inclined to read. Although studies have shown that tele-

vision does require less mental effort than reading, it is argued

that synthesizing visual and audio information engages chil-

dren in a process that is active, not passive. Third, the retar-

dation hypothesis, an associated theory that argues television

viewing deteriorates the brain, is seen as implausible for the

same reason. A fourth variety of reduction hypothesis is concentration

deterioration, which suggests that a child’s ability to concentrate

is weakened by television. This too, although popular among

critics, has found little scientic support.

Finally, anti-school hypotheses argue that children come to

expect school to be as entertaining and immediately gratifying

as television programs, and when it fails to meet these expec-

tations, pupils lose motivation. Once more, the evidence for

this is contradictory and inconclusive.

Visual Images in Education

In contrast to the attribution of negative effects to television

viewing, some educationalists have called for the visual imageto play a larger role in school curriculums which, traditionally,

have been dominated by the word. Despite the criticism of

television in general, some educational shows – such as

‘Sesame Street ’ – have achieved strong reputations.

More recently – and despite the negative issues surrounding

some games – there has been increasing interest in thepotential

of video games as educational tools. Some scholars have

argued that such games may teach not only specic educational

content but also foster the ability to learn by stimulating

cognitive development. Proponents point to the focus on

problem solving that is central to many games, and it has been

argued that video games may even encourage children to

develop a basic understanding of scientic methodology, in

which hypotheses are formed and tested, as they seek tounderstand and manipulate the game world. (For a detailed

examination of these issues, see Brown, 2008.)

In broader terms, this move toward the educational value of

images may represent a belief in the benets of acquiring what

has been termed ‘ visual literacy.’ The view is that irrespective of

content, engagement with visual media may lead to the

development of mental skills applicable beyond the under-

standing of the medium itself. To some extent, this argument is

predicated on the widely inuential work of Howard Gardner

who, in developing a theory of ‘multiple intelligences,’ argued

that different modes of communication are benecial to the

development of different types of intelligence.

However, the theory that visual imagery may encourage

both specic cognitive development and a distinctive worldview is more generally a reection of similar beliefs regarding

textual and verbal communication, as expressed, most notably,

by linguists Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf. The

perspective may also be traced to theories associated with

Marshall McLuhan, who links cognition to the technical char-

acteristics of varying media.

From this perspective, it is suggested that television-based

teaching may have a positive effect on a number of areas of

cognition, including the formation of a distinctive worldview,

170 Visual Images in the Media


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analytic reasoning, and spatial intelligence: the ability to

envision mentally, for example, what a shape might look like

from various angles. It is also suggested that exposure to certain

visual media, such as advertisements that employ metaphors,

may encourage and develop abstractive and analogical

thinking.

However, it is argued that because images primarily func-

tion as analogs of reality and are so less inclined to divide the

perceived world into particular categories in the manner char-acteristic of language, the development of a specic worldview

through exposure to visual imagery appears unlikely. (This is

not to say that the uses to which the visual image may be put –

e.g., to depict violence on television – may not have signicant

impact on one’s worldview.)

Similarly, it is judged improbable that engagement with

visual forms will enhance a viewer ’s skills in analytic thinking,

since images lack many of the propositional elements of

language (for example, it is dif cult to make statements in the

negative through images, e.g., ‘there is no more ice cream’).

While a stronger case may be made for the connection between

visual imagery and spatial intelligence, evidence for these

benets is also weak. Finally, it is argued that aspects of

abstractive or analogical thinking may indeed prot from viewing certain visual material, although the argument remains

controversial (see Messaris, 1994 for a full discussion).

More generally, there is a growing body of opinion that,

rather than teaching new cognitive skills, the representational

conventions of images are founded on informational cues that

people routinely learn to interpret through their visual experi-

ences in real life. This calls into the question the very existence

of a distinctive ‘ visual literacy ’ based on cognitive abilities

acquired through exposure to mediated imagery.

Properties of Visual Images

Overall, there is scant evidence then, that visual images – most typically in the form of television – are either detrimental to

child literacy, or signicantly contribute to distinctive cognitive

development.

However, it is clear that the image does possess distinctive

qualities. Peirce’s classication of signs into iconic, indexical,

and symbolic (Pierce, 1991) is seen as an important key to

these properties. Images that bear a resemblance to some aspect

of reality are examples of iconic signs. At the same time, the

photograph may be dened as an index ; a sign that has some

physical connection to the object or event to which it refers,

(such as ngerprints or footprints) since it is produced by the

physical effect of reected light.

These features clearly set the image apart from the word.

Iconic signs have little role in language and indexicality isentirely absent. Conversely, the visual image would normally

not rely on the type of arbitrary conventions that link signier

(representation) with signied (what is represented) in the

manner that constitutes the symbolic mode most characteristic

of language.

Another crucial distinction can be made between words and

visual images. Whereas verbal communication possesses

detailed conventions governing word order (or syntax) that

facilitate the linking of concepts, there is no such formal

convention for combining images into larger meanings,

although those who work with images, such as artists, may

develop their own. Images exhibit what is termed ‘syntactic

indeterminacy ’ that increases their ambiguity as carriers of

meaning (Messaris, 1997).

These distinct features have important consequences for the

roles that the visual image plays within society. While it is

dif cult for images to convey precise statements about the

objects they represent (e.g., ‘the man no longer enjoyssarcasm’), still the image’s characteristic iconicity, together with

less pronounced but exible symbolic properties, have allowed

the medium to convey certain, descriptive information with

a precision unmatched by words. For example, a range of

scientic elds have been advanced through the use of detailed

depictions and diagrams.

Equally, the visual image has been a boon in the develop-

ment of user-friendly computers, where iconic representations,

such as scissors and folders, have been used to replace lines of

text. At the same time, photographic indexicality has become

a vital component in the creation of historical records.

However, these properties may also have troubling

consequences.

Visual Images and Persuasion

Iconicity, indexicality, and syntactic indeterminacy bring

distinctive properties to visual persuasion, be it set to

commercial or political purposes. In an extensive study of these

issues, Messaris (1997) offers a broad range of devices through

which the advertising image may engage attention and mold

attitudes. Iconic representations of physical appearance and

interpersonal behavior may reproduce real-world visual cues

associated with a series of emotional responses; including

sexual interest and excitement. This prompting of emotion is

central to advertising strategies that seek to associate positive

feelings with the possession or consumption of products (see,

for example, Williamson, 1978). Further, iconic devices that manipulate the viewer ’s point of view (such as close-ups or

high and low angles) can incite a series of other responses,

including curiosity and trust.

The ability of iconicity to communicate information quickly

and with relatively little mental effort may contribute to

another advantage the image may have in persuasion. Some

cognitive psychologists believe that visual images are typically

processed peripherally – rather than centrally – in ways that

may decrease the likelihood of viewers engaging their full

critical and analytical faculties, especially when the speed of the

message leaves little time for reection.

The ‘truthfulness’ implied by indexicality is also a critical

ingredient in visual persuasion whenever a photographic image

is offered as proof of an advertiser ’s claims. However, visualimages may readily be made to lie through the application of

a wide range of techniques, from the staging of photographs to

airbrushing to improve appearances. Moreover, digital tech-

nology has become a powerful aid to those who would practice

such visual deception.

Finally, the syntactic indeterminacy of the image may also

have important consequences that make it more useful in

persuasion than the explicit meanings offered by words. For

example, advertisers may take advantage of this property to

Visual Images in the Media 171


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imply associations or statements that they would be unwise to

state verbally (such as the association of cigarette smoking with

healthy activity).

The implications of these properties have led to

a heightened attention to the exploration of image produc-

tion and the messages imbedded within them, most

commonly through the perspective of critical analysis. Crit-

ical cultural analysis views society as a ‘contested terrain,’

a battleground for “domination and hegemony betweencompeting gender, race, sex, ethnic, class, and other forces”

(Kellner, 2002: p. 85). From this perspective, “codes of

power are embedded in all visual images to varying degrees ”

(Sperling, 2011: p. 28).

These concerns focus on a range of issues and forms of

media, for example, the sexual objectify of women in music

videos, celebrity gossip magazines, and video games.

Two of the most debated arenas, however, remain the

persuasive effects of imagery in political and commercial

communication, and in the news.

Visual Images and Politics

While political advertising has existed, in its modern form,

since at least the 1820s, television ads have now become

a primary source of political information. Television has been

accused of having a number of detrimental consequences for

the political process. These include, in a political equivalent to

the displacement theory associated with child literacy (see

above), distracting the populace from civic involvement.

However, the area of most concern with regard to the visual

image is its effects within political advertising and televisual

campaigning.

The potency of the visual image in political persuasion is

thought to have been most graphically displayed in a debate

between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy. It is reported that the majority of those who saw the 1960 debate on television

judged Kennedy the victor, while most who listened on radio

thought Nixon had won. Typically, this result has been taken to

indicate that the more attractive image that Kennedy presented

was the deciding factor, even though other inuences have

been offered – including the possibility that it was radio that

may have favored Nixon’s patterns of delivery, while exagger-

ating Kennedy ’s Boston accent in a manner that repelled

listeners (Schudson, 1995).

The use of visual imagery for persuasive purposes becomes

most intense in political advertising. Although the public is

becoming more skilled at ‘reading ’ visual cues, it is argued that

viewers usually do not take the time to consider the way these

cues may be attempting to manipulate their attitudes, making the visual element of political ads the most crucial.

Political advertisements use many of the same visual strat-

egies as their commercial counterparts, although often exhib-

iting a strong reliance on iconic visual effects. Patriotic appeals

are common in the political advertisement or campaign, and

the use of certain visual symbols – including the national ag –

has been found to be especially prevalent. Equally, the use of

family imagery, such as images of spouses and of children,

remains common.

The iconicity of visual imagery has been held responsible

for other political strategies that accentuate appearance over

content. Many make extensive use of devices that appear to be

modeled on people’s real-world experiences of interpersonal

space. For example, politicians interviewed on television will

typically turn toward the camera, and therefore toward the

viewer, in order to imitate the real-world appearance of a direct

and candid approach. Similarly, the use of color to create

emotional impact is widespread in political advertisements.Bright colors are used to connote positive images, while gray or

black and white are frequently employed in attack ads to help

prompt a negative response.

Visual Images and the News

Equally controversial has been the inuence of the visual image

in news. The entry of the image into an arena that had tradi-

tionally been the province of the word was originally viewed

with consternation, both by journalists and by many outside of

the profession, as the use of visual material developed from

artwork through woodcut engraving to early photographs.

Visual images continued to be regarded as a medium that bypassed the reasoning mind and, as such, appeared to

threaten journalism’s Enlightenment heritage. While the

photograph was held in higher esteem in the picture magazine,

this had little impact on its critics.

Yet at the same time, the photographic record, as metaphor,

as well as in practice, came to underpin the journalistic enter-

prise. By the mid-nineteenth century, there was widespread

typication of the newspaper as a ‘daguerreotype’ (an early

camera) of the social and natural world, with the indexicality of

the process being used to exemplify, and give credence to,

claims of journalistic objectivity (Zelizer, 1998: p. 9).

However, Photoshop and other digital techniques have

made it increasingly easy to falsify photographs, with such

practices nding their way into the news. More broadly, criticshave argued that the apparent immediacy of the news photo-

graph works to render invisible the human agency involved in

its production. In practice, every image is subject to selection,

interpretation, and, often, alteration as it works its way through

the news process.

The news photograph embodies the perspective of the

photographer who selects a particular camera angle; the page

designer or editor who frequently selects one shot from a large

number taken of an event and who may then crop the image;

and the headline or caption writer where the photograph will

be combined with, and interpreted through, text, while

simultaneously being bounded within the newspaper ’s policy

on how photographs may be deployed. At each stage the image

is made to conform to a certain narrative structure – a newsangle or theme – with its meaning inevitably being colored and

manipulated by that association. As Stuart Hall observes:

“News photos operate under a hidden sign marked ‘this really

happened, see for yourself.’ Of course, the choice is this

moment of an event as against that, of this person rather than

that, of this angle rather than any other. Indeed the selection of

this photographed incident to represent a whole complex chain

of events and meaning, is a highly ideological procedure”

(Hall, 1973: p. 241).



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Similarly, in response to claims that the photography offers

a transparent ‘codeless’ window on the world of newsworthy

events, scholars have pointed to the use of photographs, in all

news media, as being a practice based on cultural codes of

understanding (such as an eagle representing freedom in

America), as well to the connotative properties inherent in the

practice itself. Roland Barthes (1977), among others, has

argued that the photograph fullls not only a denotative (or

referential) but also a connotative (or interpretive) function, which undermines its claim to be unmediated truth.

Visual symbolism is frequently used in news to carry

messages that stretch far beyond the photograph’s referential

qualities, with such techniques used to provide photographic

validation of “abstract issues and qualities that cannot, in

the normal sense, be validated visually ” (Huxford, 2001:

p. 45). Huxford offers three classications of photographic

symbolism routinely employed in the press on both sides of

the Atlantic; temporal, in which time frames are evoked and

utilized within the newspage; metaphorical, where analogical

associations are employed; and synthetic which entails gross

distortions of reality.

In all these ways, the news photograph, be it on the page,

computer screen, or in broadcast lm, may be far from either ‘neutral’ or ‘objective.’

More recently, the focus of research has shifted away from

issues surrounding the veracity of the news photograph, and

toward thesocial and cultural functions that news photography

may fulll. This development highlights the ritual work of

journalism in social life, specically its role in creating and

sustaining both communal and individual identities. The

unifying work of ritual and of ritualistic journalism becomes

particularly crucial when death or destruction threatens the

social order. Research following this line of inquiry has

included Dayan and Katz’s exploration of the live coverage of

events of signicant social meaning; what is described as the

‘contests,’ ‘conquests,’ and ‘coronations’ that relate to one or

more of the core values of society (1992: p. 199). Similarly it isargued that news images may be translated into ‘ lived images’

during community ritual, being appropriated and reworked in

ways that may empower and heal the community. For example,

the striking and dramatic news imagery that was a central focus

of the attack on the United States in 9/11 later reemerged in

new ways in local carnivals and parades, with oats featuring

pictures and models of the Twin Towers restored to their

former glory (Cooneld and Huxford, 2009).

Digital Images

The ascendency of the image and the controversy over its effects

in such areas as education, politics, and news have beenaccelerated and intensied by the rise of digital media.

While the Web has, arguably, given fresh impetus to text

and allowed the word and image to interact in new ways, Web

designers frequently give more space and visual weight to

imagery. Moreover, streaming video is gaining increasing

importance on the Web as technology and bandwidthimprove.

A signicant aspect of this new digital frontier is the manner

in which it has fostered expertise in creating and manipulating

digital imagery, turning users from passive viewers of images

into active participants. The development of digital photog-

raphy has prompted a substantial leap in the number of

pictures being produced. By 2004, 28 billion digital photos

then were being taken annually in the U.S., 6 billion more

photos were shot on lm, even though twice as many people

owned lm-roll cameras than digital (Murray, 2008: p. 152).

The downloading and placing of such photographs on home

pages, social networking sites, and blogs is now ubiquitous,

while many individuals are also producing their own videoclips, segments of animation, and even short movies. At the

same time, a host of online communities that hone and spread

this digital expertise have emerged in recent years. As Sperling

argues, “ Today ’s students also form individual identities and

act online; they are at home with the Interweb ’s visual archi-

tectures and intellectual platforms; and they actively embrace

the informality of its connections, its unstable transactions, the

uidity of its borders, and its shifting and disorienting discur-

sive spaces” (2011: p. 28).

While the Web has been described as a ‘digital utopia’

(Rosen, 2001: p. 318), many of the issues surrounding the

deceptive and potentially damaging effects of visual represen-

tation have followed images into cyberspace. Digital media has

provided those who would perpetrate visual fakery with anarsenal of increasingly subtle and effective tools. At the same

time, the range of visual networks through which today ’s

online users move and the speed of those operations raise the

likelihood that many images will register subconsciously, as

unexamined beliefs and assumptions are prompted and

absorbed.

However, the apparent vulnerability of the digital audi-

ence to visual trickery has been questioned. Some scholars

argue that the key feature of today ’s ‘post-photographic age,’

where the digital image has replaced traditional emulsion-

based photography, is that all pictures are seen as articial

representations of reality and are thus treated with increasing

skepticism (e.g., Farid, 2009: pp. 42–44). Others are less

sanguine. Messaris (2012), while acknowledging that the Web’s digital networks have made it easier for the detection

of visual manipulation to be publicized, also points out that

awareness of the likelihood of digital manipulation does not

necessarily translate into an ability to detect its use in

specic instances.

Examples of digital manipulation of photographs that go

undetected can be found in two key areas discussed in this

article: political communication and news coverage. For

instance, one experiment staged at Stanford University at the

time of the 2004 Presidential election has implications for

political persuasion. In this, photographs of the facial features

of test subjects were subtly combined with the faces of either

Republican George Bush or Democrat John Kerry. The subjects

were then asked to make a preference between the photographsof the two politicians.

Researcher Jeremy Bailenson and his colleagues found that

while the choices of highly partisan voters were unaffected by

this manipulation, among those with less certain political

preference the facial ‘morphs’ had the effect of swinging

people’s choices in the direction of the morph that included

their own facial features. This held true even though the

subjects demonstrated no conscious awareness of the manip-

ulation (Bailenson et al., 2008).

Visual Images in the Media 173


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Similarly, there are instances in news, as Messaris points

out, when even journalists have been fooled by digitally

doctored photographs. For example, when a fake photograph

of the dead Osama bin Laden was posted online by unknown

sources, the image was used on a number of well-regarded

news sites before being exposed as a hoax.

Summarizing this debate, Messaris suggests, “In address-

ing this issue a researcher would have to go beyond the

methodology of traditional surveys. The evidence wouldhave to come from the examination of people ’s spontaneous

reactions to images. Without a systematic look at such data,

all claims about the effects of digital media on the public ’s

attitudes towards images will necessarily remain highly

conjectural” (2012: p. 10).

See also: Advertising and Advertisements; Advertising: Effects;

Advertising: General; British Cultural Studies; Computer Games

and Academic Achievement; Educational Media: Potentials for

Learning; Film and Video Industry; Journalism and Journalists;

Journalism; Mass Media, Representations in; Media Effects on

Children; Media Effects; Media Events; Media and Child

Development; New Media, News Production and Consumption;

News: General; Photography as a Medium; PoliticalAdvertising; Political Communication; Semiotics; Social Media;

Television: General; Violence and Media.

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Visual Images in the Media