In this assignment, you will pick a television program and watch at least three episodes from that show. You will want to:

• Analyze what behaviors are repeatedly observed, what influence these behaviors may have on individuls who watch the program regularly, what stereotypes are reinforced by the program, and what long-term effects may result from the program. 
• In addition, examine the advertising content with regard to the target market of the ads (gender, age, socioeconomic status (SES)). 
• Be sure to include SCHOLARLY research to help make sense of your results (with proper citations).

Scholarly research includes articles published in academic journals, written by researches in academic and professional institutions based on sound scientific study. This research follows a strict process of reviewing articles called "peer review," in which scholars, experts, and academics review and comment on the validity, accuracy, and methodology of the research and paper. To learn more about the peer review process and its importance, watch the following video:

Video Transcript

Finding the right scholarly articles for your research is a multi-step process. You can follow these steps to help you find relevant articles for this assignment. But keep in mind that while there are steps to follow, this is not necessarily a linear process. You might have to repeat steps a few times and go back and forth as you find new information.

Step 1: Identify behaviors and stereotypes in the television episodes

• As you analyze the episodes and the ads you watch, make note of any behaviors or stereotypes related to age, gender, race, ethnicity, geography, etc.

Step 2: Identify how these behaviors and stereotypes might influence how people act and behave

• Consider how the behaviors or stereotypes you've observed in this show influence people in real life. For example, does anyone you know use language, styles, or stereotypes from this show?

Step 3: Formulate a research question

• For a research question, you'll want to consider how the advertisements relate to the target market. Do the advertisement appeal predominately to a specific gender, race, or socioeconomic target market?  If so, what kind of advertisements did you see?

Example research question:

• Do advertisers target white women with beauty advertisements during prime time television dramas?

Step 4: Identify keywords from your research question

• Once you have an initial research question, identify the key concepts in your question that you can then use as search terms.

Example search terms:

• Race, Female/Women, Beauty/Attraction, Television/Prime-Time/Drama, commercials/advertisements

Step 5: Search for scholarly articles in one of the following databases

• Use the search terms you identified to find relevant articles, making sure to try different combinations of keywords to see which yield the best results.