Social and Cultural Issues of Interactive Media

This paper evaluates the socio-cultural issues that have originated from the innovation and revolution of interactive media. It explores the impact on society, education, gaming, social media, and cultural values.

Running head: SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ISSUES OF INTERACTIVE
MEDIA
Social and Cultural Issues of Interactive Media
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1SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ISSUES OF INTEACTIVE MEDIA
Interactive Media, often known as the “rich media”, generally refers to the modes or
tools used by the people to communicate with others. A precise definition is, interactive
media is the mode of communication wherein the users input data that are processed and
showed by the digital tools. The output generated by the media varies and depends upon the
inputs provided by the users. N.V.Philips, first brought the concept of the interactive media
with his invention of videodisc (Meikle, 2014). The innovation of laser technology changed
the face of the interactive media with updated and computers with analogue images. Further,
introduction of Graphical User Interface (GUI) revolutionized the industry and introduced the
visual conceit and information sharing processes (Peters et al. 2013). Further, the launching
of Microsoft and Windows programmes expanded the reach of these media globally and the
concept of market and society and community changed drastically. Interactive Media allows
one to experience and understanding of social media. It enables one to involve in the process
of social media. There are dominantly nine major forms of interactive media, visual posts,
application software, virtual reality, publications, social media, advertising, games, cinema
and theme parks. Therefore, to summarize, Interactive media appropriate the purposes of the
users through a combination of graphics, digital images, and electronic texts (Walker, 2013).
The interactive media is further divided into multimedia, intermedia hypermedia.
Multimedia, as the name suggests, uses various contents and stands in contrast to media that
uses the basic form of contents. They can be recorded or be used live. Hypermedia is a data
based retrieval system that is not liner and essentially refers to the video, image and graphics
related subjects. A basic example of hypermedia will be World Wide Web (WWW). All the
HTML programmes are interpreted through the usage of hypermedia. Multimedia and
hypermedia re the upgraded formations which have increased the visual quality and fidelity.
Intermedia on the other hand is the art work. As Higgins had put it, Intermedia is something
that is between the media, sculpture and something else. This particular term ‘between’,

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captures the understandings and meanings of the works that are the resultant of Intermediary
thoughts and practices (Rangel, 2015). Interactive media has changed the outlook of the
society and the relationships around us. However, the ongoing exploration of the interactive
media has impacted the society over the time bit positively and negatively. Therefore, the aim
of the following paper is to evaluate the socio-cultural issues that have originated by the
innovation and revolution of interactive media.
In this light, the concept of Dystopia must be discussed. The negative effects brought
about by the technologies are referred to as Dystopia. The essential features of Dystopia are,
they are characterized by fundamentally de-democratizing properties and are further
influenced and controlled by them (Bernat, 2013). One of the de-democratizing effects is the
cyber politics (Morgan, 2014). Therefore, drawn from the above argument, it can be said that
the technologies are often used as the tools to change and reshape the society. This concept is
known as ‘technological determinism’ (Rambe & Nel, 2015). It is a reductionist theory that
explains how the technological factors influence and control the mind-set of the human
beings. The term was coined by the Veblen to explain technology driving the society and
culture (Lawson, 2013). Marx has portrayed the positive facet of the concept and pointed out
that the technological progress will add up to the production of the society and in turn benefit
the social and economic aspects of the society. However, the relation between society and
technology also refers to the negative relations as well. It dissocialises key components of
social change by isolating innovation from the social world inside which it lives, while in the
meantime contending this self-governing power, is the system for achieving social change
(Bau et al. 2014). Therefore, as mentioned before, this paper will talk about the negative
impact of technologies upon the society.
One of the greatest use of Interactive Media is its use in the learning processes. The
process of multimedia learning is introduced and explored due to the revolution in the

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Information and Communication Skills. The processes of interactive media provides an all-
inclusive approach to the process of education and makes the process of learning more
attractive and interesting. It has reshaped the outlook of the learning processes in the
traditional societies (Mason, 2013). However, it often poses challenges for both the students
and the teachers. While the students need to be briefly and properly explained and must get
accustomed to the technology, the teachers must also make sure that the instructions are
properly and comprehensively made. For the students, who are used to with the traditional
modes of learning, face much difficulties with getting used to with the new mode of computer
based learning processes. The experience in the virtual classroom and the course-
management system is extremely different than the experiences in the traditional classroom.
The online conversation among students and the teachers require being more active than the
face to face conversation in a classroom with passive listening and noting down important
points (Liaw & Huang, 2013). Moreover, in the classroom ambience, the exchanges of
information and learning among the peers often prove to be very beneficial and helpful,
which the virtual learning processes lack. Further, the online learning process requires an
easy accessibility to strong internet connection. Often it is seen that the students left out from
an important part of the conversation due to internet connection issues and thus got
procrastinated than the others (Voogt et al., 2013). More importantly virtual learning requires
a good computer system which is may not be available to a lot of students. It also requires for
the students to be very tech savvy and technologically sound but many students lack proper
technological understanding of the computers. They only have the basic knowledge of the
computer but that may not be sufficient enough (Elkaseh, Wong & Fung, 2016). Furthermore,
the virtual learning provides the students the access of the Google with an easy access to the
river of knowledge and the people are losing the habit of reading. Reading is not only a good
habit but it contributes to the character building of a student as well. Further, the students,

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while on the process of the online reading are often redirected to other links or web pages
which is distracting, irrelevant and time consuming and maybe filled with inappropriate
content.
Furthermore, the concept of video gaming has proved to be a social ill. Along with the
positive effects of video gaming, such as, improved cognition power and time management
and accuracy and quick learning processes and problem solving skills, it has some major
negative effects on the people, especially among the teenagers. The hysterical video games
often create aggression among the students. Multiple researches have proved that the violent
gaming habit among the teenagers are a sole cause for increased aggression among the
teenagers. The habit of pathological games creates depression and anxiety among the people
and the get them addictive. This further leads to poor achievements in the academics
(Radesky, Schumacher & Zuckerman, 2015) . Addiction to the games leads to poor
performance in the studies and then poor achievements in the exams. This is especially true
for the children. Further video games also cause health hazards. The increased rate of
childhood obesity and optic issues among the children are a direct result of increased gaming
habit among the same.
The extreme usage of social media also is an addictive behaviour. Being active on
social media is a current trend which is also an addictive behaviour causing performance
issues and health hazards among all. This is not a scenario limited to the teenagers only but is
very much present and true for the adults as well. Working people are often seen being active
on the social media during the work hour as well that negatively impacts upon their
performance. Social media is the ultimate form of interactive media (Shan et al. 2015).
Herein, people can express their personal feelings, experiences and thoughts as well as can
view upon the posts put up by others. This has a major positive aspect, that is, it enables
people to express their thoughts ensuring their freedom of speech and expression but at the

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same time it induces social unrest, tension and security issues. The essential issue that is
observed is the privacy issues faces by the people. Often people have been seen to have
deactivated their social media accounts or have seen to be inactive on some particular social
media like, Facebook, due to privacy issues. Also, the terms and conditions that the users are
asked to acknowledge are mostly vague and they in directly gratify the users’ permission to
use check and use their accounts. Therefore, their personal content and personal search
engines area accessed by those organisations which then invoke a sense of threat and create
privacy issues (Schultz & Peltier, 2013). Moreover, social media enables people to be
deceptive, easily. Since anyone can make their account on social media, people can easily
make an account with a fake details or using details of someone else. This again, induces
threats and privacy issues (Brodmerkel & Carah, 2013). Moreover, it is often seen that people
make racist, gender biased comments which is offensive and insulting to some communities.
This in turn invokes social unrests. There had been many instances where the comment son
social media has invoked communal or religious tensions and further has caused strife. Social
media also hazards the security of a person. Instances over time, have proved that the social
media, that gives people access to a platform to express their viewpoints and opinions are
also the place, where people especially, Political leaders and celebrities, are often attacked by
other political bodies and other people. They are often posed with aggression of the mob as
well (Korda & Itani, 2013).
Media has always been perceived as the social tool to influence ad shape the culture
of a place but there is a complex and negative facet to that. Often the shared messages are
misinterpreted or not accepted or misconstrued or acted upon in an ill manner. They often
convey contradictory messages as well and further promote anomalous paths. However, the
digital media of the age has revolutionised the face of the cultural life and the life style of the
society. It is essentially true for the political culture of today’s age. Due to the online platform

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more and more people come up and share their personal views. Also the political leaders can
go for crowd-funding. However, there are some negative aspects as well. Since the online
platform is accessible to all, the political leaders are often found to be attacked by the
aggression of the crowd. People can talk and critic directly, use curse words socially which
are very upsetting for the leaders (Hu et al. 2014). Also, they often become the faces in funny
pictures or cartoons and become the subject of abusive and obnoxious memes. Such
outrageousness is not acceptable and completely discourteous.
Further, with the advancement of technology, the world has become a big, wide
society where everyone is connected to everyone and the world market and economy is
interrelated and interdependent. However, along with this, the cultural values of the world are
also exchanged which, in turn are contributing negatively and affecting the daily lives of the
people. There is a growing trend of following the American culture world-wide. America is a
third world country with extreme modern thoughts and values which have both positive and
negative aspects but, the other culture who are imitating the American cultural values, are
following it blindly. Therefore, American social life, food habits and other such things, when
followed by other cultures and societies, then they lose out on their own cultural values.
Since they follow blindly, therefore they even accept their negative aspects as well which is
bad for any country (Livingstone, 2013). Moreover, America being a first world country is
way more advanced and modernised, but the third world countries like those of Africa or
South Asia, they are certainly not that advance and modernised (Jenkins, Ford & Green,
2018). Therefore, the latter are not yet completely ready to accept such waves of modernism,
but they tend to follow such newness. This turn poise a lot of political and social challenges
to the country as well as its people. Further, the traditional population of these third world
countries are very restrictive towards changes which poses social challenges to the aged as
well as to the younger generation.

7SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ISSUES OF INTEACTIVE MEDIA
The concepts like Online Dating, Online Friends and the like are accepted and extremely
cherished. However, such practices are putting an end to the meaningful relationships. Many
people are finding love and the right guy or girl to get married to but at the same time the rate
of divorces are also going up. This in turn, is introducing breakage of relationships and
changing the family values. Today, a child with separated families have two sets of parents
and four sets of extended families (Reed, 2014). Such is the new family pattern in this
globalised, modernised, tech-savvy world. The children have now new sets of family values
with new sets of rituals and symbols. His is essentially bad because the concept and meaning
of any relationships has changes and modified and are loosely coupled. Steven Strogatz, a
professor of the Cornell University opined that, the usage of social media and bonding and
friendship through the social media is making it difficult for the users to differentiate between
the casual and meaningful relationship, and this is jeopardizing our personal life and personal
space. With increased attention upon the casual relationships, the important contacts and
relations are getting weaker and finally broken. Further, the people are now more focused and
concerned with getting socially accepted that they are now paying attention to their close
groups of the in virtual world (Walther et al. 2015). Thus, people are losing out on important
relationships and friendships and at the end of the day end up being alone. This has thus,
increase the rate of depression among the population. In a study, it is evaluated that the
people who are more active on the social media are more prone to and actually are suffering
from depression.
Furthermore, the digitization of childhood has changed the face of the concept of
childhood in today’s date. It is interpreted as the urgent response to the need for revamp of
technologies to interact which has, again, negatively contributed to the society at large. The
digitization was made to bring in the outdoor activities of the children into indoor. The
concept essentially emerged from the thought of child safety and child health. Such

8SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ISSUES OF INTEACTIVE MEDIA
understandings led to the restriction on the habits of the children which has largely affected
the growth structure of the children. This is true for both physical and mental growth. Further,
their peer relation is also restricted to home. With the advancement of technologies, the
concept of friendship has changed into online friends. Therefore, they do not need to go
outside and socialise with others. This phenomenon is known as the bedroom culture and is in
trend. Bedroom culture has two meanings, one is where the children are restricted inside with
the amenities of online gaming and online peer group through the access of internet
(Chatzithomas, 2014). Secondly, it also refers to the family structures with one television
projected in the drawing area where everybody sits and enjoys the TV together. This is
especially true for the neutral; family culture. This increases privatisation and individuation
and neutral family values and dawns upon the new concept of self-socialisation. Moreover,
today’s media can be customised according to the viewer. This refers to more privatisation
and segmentation among the people.
Another aspect of change that have been brought into by the interactive media is the
Language inputs. With the increase of the online conversation modes, and applications, the
language inputs have broken, shaped and re-shaped. The modern students and youth have
found their own ways of expression sand abbreviated languages. These languages are very
ambiguous and extremely informal. The long words are now broken and abbreviated. Some
of them have even found their place in the dictionaries because of their large acceptance and
growing popularization. The people are now more tended to text and whatsapp and tweet
each other that they need short and precise modes of conversation. Hence the formation of
new languages. However, this have hugely impacted upon the existing traditional culture.
With the innovation of the newer words, the old traditional words are losing their importance.
Lot of students do not even know their existence or proper usage. The richness and beauty of
the literature are also lost today because of the same. The literature language of today’s age

9SOCIAL AND CULTURAL ISSUES OF INTEACTIVE MEDIA
are so informal and lucid that the amplitude are lost (Barron et al., 2014). Moreover, with the
innovation of various applications like Grammarly and the like, writing a sentence has also
become easier. Students can easily check their grammatical errors and construct a beautiful
sentence with nicer, synonymous words. Therefore, writing a sentence has become so easier
that even a person with minimum knowledge and no jargon can even write a beautiful
sentence. This in turn proves the loss of knowledge that is present amongst the students.
More importantly, globalization have made English the richest and most practices and widely
accepted language across the world. This in turn has resulted into the loss of many ethnic
languages and cultures. Lastly, excessive usage of social and interactive media has increased
the social distance among the people. They have and talk to a friend who stays miles across
but do not really know their own neighbourhood. The concept of neighbourhood is expanding
and changing. The need of a neighbourhood is changing as well. People now have various
sets of friends who can serve any of their purposes that they do not need the people who stay
around their locality (Van Dijck, 2013). Moreover, the increasing sense of individuation and
privatisation also results into changes in the meanings and concepts of neighbourhood that
now have lesser significance.
Therefore, to conclude, it can be said that, although the contributions made by the
interactive media in the society due to the advancement technology, cannot be denied, but at
the same time, the negative aspects of the same, must be included as well. Interactive media
has made our life easier and more exciting. We can get and know everything with a finger
touch but at the same time this getting everything within seconds has made us more and more
unsocial. The more the world is expanding, the more we are keeping into our rooms tied with
our mobile phones and computers. The more the world is becoming a big open society with
access to all, the more we are becoming segmented, separated, privatised and we are

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becoming more and more individualised and the concept and meaning of the interactive
media has proved to be an ironical innovation of the world.

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