Media Stereotypes on Black Women - Scholarly

Reality TV has stereotyped African American women. The article mentions “endorsement of stereotypes by African American women about their own group and the potential for self-deprecation is a critical point to explore from a cultivation theory lens” (p. 184). This is saying that repeated exposure to TV messages can help shape a viewers’ mind, attitude, etc. So, if there are stereotypes on specific groups of people on TV, then viewers will start to see those groups as they are expressed on TV, “media messages help reproduce these misconceptions and contribute to the prevalence and longevity of these stereotypic images” (Abraham & Appiah, 2006) (p. 185). This article introduces a study done on how the media affects stereotypes on black women, and if viewers really believe in the realism of TV content. In doing this, they included that “there is some evidence to suggest that Black women themselves endorse these widespread stereotypical beliefs about Black women” (Thomas et al., 2004) (p. 185). So, even viewers of the same gender and race are believing in the stereotypes presented to them through reality TV. As the article concludes, “the media play a major role in socializing audiences (Arnett, 1995; Coyne, Padilla-Walker, & Howard, 2013) by transmitting messages about how one should be in the world and shaping attitudes and beliefs” (Adams et al., 2010) (p. 186).

After reading about the study and results of this article I’d have to say that I am not surprised. Media, whether it’s TV, Instagram, Twitter, etc. there’s always stereotypes. On reality TV and other shows or movies, their goals are to have lots of people watching and being entertained. With media like this, they want to create shows that entertain, and when entertaining on shows not everything has to be truthful and a lot of people in these businesses put things in the media to draw viewers’ attention. People post and share their opinions about issues all the time and it attracts attention to viewers, and as sad as it is, some people really do believe everything they see or hear. I think it’s unfair that groups of people who are being stereotyped are some of the same people believing it. I think this article is right about the fact that reality TV media is creating attention to things that are false and it’s messing with the way people view things, and that’s a big issue in society. I put the link at the bottom of this post in case you are interested in reading about this study. -Kelly

Coleman, M.Nicole, et al. “The Relation of Black-Oriented Reality Television Consumption and Perceived Realism to the Endorsement of Stereotypes of Black Women.” Psychology of Popular Media, vol. 9, no. 2, Apr. 2020, pp. 184–193. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1037/ppm0000223.