Gutenberg’s age and the subsequent modern era needed to overcome a major obstacle to achieve an enlightened society: literacy. The ability to read and write concerned educators, politicians, social reformers, and philosophers. Many reasoned a literate population could capably seek out information, stay informed about the day’s news, communicate effectively, and make informed decisions in many spheres of life. Because of this, literate people made better citizens, parents, and workers. Several centuries later, as global literacy rates grew, merely possessing the skill to read and write proved inefficient in reaching the goal. In a media-saturated world, individuals must sort through and analyze the information they confront daily. In the second half of the 20th century, the skill of decoding and processing the messages and symbols transmitted via media became known as media literacy. According to the nonprofit National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE), a media-literate person can access, analyze, evaluate, and communicate information. John Culkin, a pioneering advocate for media literacy education, remarked, “The new mass media—film, radio, TV—are new languages, their grammar as yet unknown (Moody, 1993).” Media literacy seeks to give media consumers the ability to understand this new language.

Benefits of Improving Media Literacy Skills

Culkin called the pervasiveness of media “the unnoticed fact of our present,” calling the omnipresence of media information easy to overlook as the air people breathe (and, he noted, “some would add that it is just as polluted”) (Moody, 1993). Exposure to media occurs so prolifically and early in life that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no screen time for children under the age of two (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2011). People of all ages benefit from improving their media literacy skills, not just younger generations. Today’s Americans get much of their information from various media sources—but not all that information gets created equally. Media literacy education helps its practitioners by advocating they skeptically examine and question mass communication messages.

Advertising

Many of the hours people spend with media involves commercially-sponsored content. The digital advertising firm adfuel estimates the average person exposes themselves to 4,000 to 10,000 advertisements daily (adfuel, 2024). The media bombards children (and adults) with contradictory messages—newspaper articles discussing the obesity epidemic run side by side with ads touting soda, candy, and fast food. The American Academy of Pediatrics maintains that advertising directed to children under the age of 8 is “inherently deceptive” and exploitative because young children can’t tell the difference between programs and commercials (Shifrin, 2005). Advertising often uses techniques of psychological pressure to influence decision-making. Ads may appeal to vanity, insecurity, prejudice, fear, or the desire for adventure. Advertisers also use these techniques to sell ideas—antismoking public service announcements may rely on disgusting images of blackened lungs to shock viewers to forego the habit. Nonetheless, media literacy involves teaching people to protect their interests as consumers by evaluating media claims with a critical eye.

Bias, Spin, and Misinformation

Advertisements may have the goal of selling a product or idea, but media-literate consumers of information may discover other agendas appearing in mass communication messages. A politician may hope to persuade potential voters that he has their best interests at heart. Ostensibly objective journalists may allow their political leanings to subtly slant their articles. Magazine writers might avoid criticizing companies that advertise heavily in their pages. News reporters may sensationalize stories to boost ratings—and advertising rates.

Individuals create mass-communication messages, and each individual has his or her own set of values, assumptions, and priorities. Accepting media messages at face value could lead to confusion because of all the contradictory information available. For example, even though 97% of all scientists believe humans have caused climate change, conflicting narratives that populate online forums can overwhelm the scientific consensus (NASA, 2024). More specifically, both major candidates of the 2020 U.S. presidential election saturated the airwaves with conflicting information about the handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. Trump’s campaign highlighted his administration’s efforts to rapidly develop and distribute vaccines, touting Operation Warp Speed as a major success. Biden, however, accused Trump’s administration of failing to adequately address the crisis and underestimating its severity. Voters could find such contradictory information confusing. Media literacy involves educating people to look critically at media messages. The challenge becomes sifting through the various mass media messages arriving daily and making sense of the conflicting information.

New Skills for a New World

In the past, educational institutions provided students with the information they deemed necessary to successfully engage with the world. Students memorized multiplication tables, state capitals, famous poems, and notable dates. Today, however, individuals have vast amounts of information available at the click of a mouse or touch of a screen. Even before the advent of the Internet, communications scholar David Berlo foresaw the consequences of expanding information technology: “Most of what we have called formal education has been intended to imprint on the human mind all of the information that we might need for a lifetime.” Changes in technology necessitate changes in how people learn, Berlo noted, and these days “education needs to be geared toward the handling of data rather than the accumulation of data (Shaw, 2003).”

Wikipedia, a hugely popular Internet encyclopedia, continues to propel discussions within the academic world. It has remained at the forefront of the debate on the proper use of online sources. In 2007, Middlebury College banned the use of Wikipedia as a source in history papers and exams. One of the school’s librarians noted that the online encyclopedia “symbolizes the best and worst of the Internet. It’s the best because everyone gets his/her say and can state their views. It’s the worst because people who use it uncritically take for truth what is only opinion (Byers, 2007).” Or, as comedian and satirist Stephen Colbert put it, “Any user can change any entry, and if enough other users agree with them, it becomes true (Colbert, 2006).” A computer registered to the U.S. Democratic Party changed the Wikipedia page for Rush Limbaugh to proclaim that he was “racist” and a “bigot,” and a person working for the electronic voting machine manufacturer Diebold was found to have erased paragraphs connecting the company to Republican campaign funds (Fildes, 2007 ). Media literacy teaches today’s students how to sort through the Internet’s cloud of data, locate reliable sources, and identify bias and unreliable sources.

Artificial intelligence, or AI, promises to revolutionize not only mass communication but the modern world. The explosion of services like ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and Claude provide both opportunities and pitfalls for scholars and citizens, and the integration of these tools into modern society will likely accelerate in the coming years. Modern media users will need media literacy skills to protect themselves from malignant AI forces like deepfake videos and AI imagery.

Individual Accountability and Popular Culture

Ultimately, media literacy indicates that powerful media conglomerates construct mass media messages with various aims in mind and that it falls to the individual to evaluate and interpret these media messages. Education, life experience, and a host of other factors make each person interpret constructed media in different ways; no correct way to interpret any media message exists. But on the whole, improving media literacy skills helps people function better in their media-rich environment, enabling them to function as better democratic citizens, smarter shoppers, and more skeptical media consumers. When analyzing media messages, consider the following:

1. Author: Consider who presents the information. Does it come from a news organization, a corporation, or an individual? What links or references do they have to the information they have provided?
2. Format: Television and print media often use images to grab people’s attention. Do the visuals only present one side of the story? Does the footage contain overly graphic imagery designed to provoke a specific reaction? Which celebrities or professionals endorse this message?
3. Audience: Consider the viewpoints of others. Would someone of the opposite gender feel the same way about this message? How might someone of a different race or nationality feel? How might an older or younger person interpret the information differently? Was this message made to appeal to a specific audience?
4. Content: Even content providers who try to present information objectively can have an unconscious bias. Analyze who presents the message. Does he or she have any clear political affiliations? Has this person received compensation for speaking?
5. Purpose: All mass media messages have a reason for transmission. What reaction does the message try to provoke? Does the speaker try to make the audience feel or act a certain way? Examine the information closely and look for possible hidden agendas.

By considering these viewpoints, people can ensure that they stay informed about where their information comes from and why they received it—important steps to improve any media literacy education (Center for Media Literacy).