Social Construction of Reality
The Social Construction of Reality theory is a process when people get an understanding and meaning of some part of reality though communicating with other people about it. This is done largely though forms of mass communications, for instance through television and movies (DeFleur, Kearney, Plax, & DeFleur, 2005). This can be further explained though examples.
Take for instance how America is portrayed through movies and television. There are crime shows and scandalous affairs. When people from other countries view these shows, this is how they view ordinary American lives to be, because this is all they see of us. They have the understanding that police officers go around shooting in the streets, and that everybody has love affairs. Their understanding of Americans becomes distorted from the entertainment America produces, but this is what they see and know about Americans.
The theorists who thought of this theory are Peter Ludwig Berger and Thomas Luckmann (hartsem.edu).
Click here to view an article of how television influenced young girls in Fiji to start losing weight and have eating disorders.
