Media Effects On Child Abuse

Child abuse is the mistreatment of a young child, which results in a number of communal, emotional, and mental problems. Child abuse outbreaks have grown in number across the country, but also how the media portrays and demonstrates the problem to the public has turned into an even greater issue, which must be examined and addressed. The media plays a large role in how crimes are portrayed to the public and how the victims of those crimes are portrayed as well. The media is a dominant factor in affecting the way the public views crime and the resultant victims. For example, when a child is abused the media seems to pay more attention to the perpetrator (criminal justice side) and how they are being punished than those who have actually experienced

The media not only reinforces stranger danger myths about child abuse but it also forgets to mention the effects this disastrous act has on a family. It is proven that children who suffer from child sexual abuse in their childhood are at further risk of getting revictimized in adulthood. These important factors are completely left out by the media reason as to why this is an important topic to take into consideration. In such an advanced society, the media can and should be used to make the public more knowledgeable about such sensitive and important issues. The media is ultimately the number one source that can help our society demonstrate and educate the world on all issues hidden from view. But the issue such as child abuse needs to be presented and used the right way in the media and not the wrong way. More media coverage needs to be done for families, victims, and its effects on the community instead of only the perpetrator. In a study by Dorfman (2011), a representative sample of U.S. news from the years of 2007-2009 was selected to analyze. With a sample of 260 functional articles on child abuse, Dorfman (2011) found that 73% of child sexual abuse coverage was about criminal justice, such as arrests and trials of accused perpetrators. Similar to other studies, these results demonstrates that too much of the media attention is going towards the perpetrator. When most of the media attention goes to the perpetrator we commonly find law enforcers discussing what will happen to the perpetrator and the case but never do we hear them talk about the larger issue at hand. Thus, it is important to note that just because a law enforcer may work in the criminal justice system that does not make him or her an expert in the field of child sexual abuse. We need more perspectives of victims and families; we need them to be on the lenses describing these issues because who better to