The Effect of Educational Intervention on Media Literacy among High School Female Students

Abstract

Background Recently, there has been a fast growth in the use of different kind of media especially in adolescents. Media literacy education is supported by numerous national organizations and institute as a potential tool to decrease negative media effects and to increase desirable use of media. However, there are little documents about their effects. This study was conducted to investigate the effect of educational intervention on media literacy among high school female students. Materials and Methods This quasi-experimental study was complete on 100 female students in Semirom city, Isfahan province, the central of Iran, in 2017. Eligible students were selected and randomly assigned as intervention and control groups. Then, a media literacy intervention (7 sessions of 40-55 minute) was delivered by skilled and trained educators in field of media as facilitators only in the intervention group. The media literacy measure was administered at pre-intervention, post-intervention. Data were analyzed by SPSS software (version 20.0). Results Based on results independent t-test, demographic variables in students of intervention and control groups were similar as well the mean of media literacy scores before intervention, but 2 months after the intervention the differences were statistically significant between the intervention and control groups in all media literacy domains (P <= 0.001) except the creators of media message domain (P=0.27), and the selective uses of media messages (p=0.21). Conclusion The present study recommends media literacy education can be practicably included into schools as a method to promoting critical analysis of media products.