Crime, Media, and The American Dream: The Role of Media Consumption in Institutional Anomie Theory

Messner and Rosenfeld’s Institutional Anomie Theory (IAT) is based on the assumption that the “American Dream” produces a society that is obsessed with the pursuit of success and dominated by the economy. Thus, crime is prevalent in the United States because individuals are willing to cut corners in order to attain the “dream” for themselves. This dissertation expands the work of Messner and Rosenfeld (1994), contending that the “American Dream” is transmitted directly to citizens through the consumption of media representations, using over 6000 cases from the public use portion of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (ADD Health). A series of logistic regressions were conducted to determine the influence of television consumption on committing multiple forms of serious criminal behavior. As hypothesized, television consumption directly increases the odds of committing three types of serious criminal behavior (economic based, violent, and general). In addition, the results suggest that compared to light television consumers, heavy consumers are less influenced by crime-curbing noneconomic institutions like education and the family.

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy

Level thesis:degree_level

doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Sociology

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Akron

Year dc:date

2013

Author dc:creator

• Rosenberger, Jared S.

Contributors dc:contributor

• Callanan, Valerie J.

• Sociology
• Crime
• Media
• Institutional Anomie Theory
• IAT

Statement dc:rights

• unrestricted
• This thesis or dissertation is protected by copyright: all rights reserved. It may not be copied or redistributed beyond the terms of applicable copyright laws.

Language dc:language

English

Repository record dc:identifier

http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1365173874

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:etd.ohiolink.edu:akron1365173874