Abstract
This chapter described the intimate processes of the informational system of the human body and cells and their effect on the mind in order to understand how information is received/operated and integrated in the genetic structure of the organism by epigenetic mechanisms. Individual education/learning are the basic processes allowing the knowledge/judgement of mediated reality, and for the formation of decision criteria, beliefs, and mentality. The contributive role of media in education/behavior is highlighted, revealing the positive/negative effects of the persuasive messages in interaction with individual/collective beliefs and mentality. The inoculation techniques applied in various fields of media are discussed from the informational perspective, emphasizing the implication of the cognitive centers on such processes. Big data analysis and predictive conclusions on the social effects are used nowadays as feedback support, helping the optimization of the relation between audience and media products.
TopIntroduction
As the media is par excellence a source of information, it becomes a virtual component in addition to natural informational sources, which come from the environment and the associated interactions, including inter-human communication (Gaiseanu, 2019a; McLuhan, 1994). Becoming therefore a primary source of information—time-controlled and technocrat-controlled—this organism can express its own visions as well as the interests of associated groups on which they depend. Therefore, as decider factors, these groups influence, or even determine, the orientation of the expressiveness of the informational channel.
The media should be neutral, called to reflect the realities of everyday life and not involved in politics. Even if media are subjected to rules of professional ethics or legislation, the need to vigil the nature of disseminated information follows, introducing into discussion the terms of “bio-ethics”, “ecological” and “healthy” media not harmful to man and to his vital space, and the need to “clean”/heal through intergenerational epigenetic communication (Gaiseanu, 2019a) with positive consequences not only for nowadays society but also for the future one (Shafer, 2019). In order to observe the short-term, but especially the long-term consequences, it is not only necessary, but becomes mandatory – an urgent obligation – to introduce also in this discussion the advances registered in the knowledge of the mechanisms of perception/ decision of the human being, the source and receiver of information from which media start and to which the media are addressed. Within the frame of media resources, the television, smart phones and other visual digital devices are the strongest influencing factors, taking into account at least the fact that more than 50% of brain connections are engaged in the mechanisms of human image visual perception, which is fundamental in making decisions (Gaiseanu, 2021a).
As media initiates and supports a communication process between two partners, i.e., a source and a receiver, we must focus on the mechanisms of life, either from the perspective of neurosciences, or from the perspective of information science, to observe the biological mechanisms of the reception and interpretation of informational messages in the human, who is actually the receiving “terminal” of mass media communication (Gaiseanu, 2019a). Information penetrates deeper into the public life and society not only through our modern means of communication – based primarily on the exponential development of microcircuit / smart chip technologies of the transmission, TV or internet devices – but also through the involvement of information in the human organism, leading or changing the life. We can observe in this way a strong correlation between internal functioning, controlled by inexorable natural mechanisms, and behavior at the macro-level, and understand how the received information induces/determines functional and even structural modifications in the human as an individual, and in society as a whole.
By means of the communication process, mass media supports today the inter-relations between various ethnic groups and communities with various distinct cultures, mentalities, and specific behavior characteristics according to regional development, no matter their geographical distance or location (Damota, 2019). We are nowadays the witnesses of an unprecedented universalization of communications, which bring to each individual the possibility of knowing and understanding people from distant geographical areas, serving rapprochement between various groups and, actually, for the birth and consolidation of a planetary, trans-national consciousness. Therefore, it becomes even more important that media not only fulfill their role as a source of information, but also assume the role of forming collective and group attitudes, even for the whole of society, towards information and the decision-makers of information sources (Paul et al., 2013). The direct inter-relationship between the society as receiver/consumer of information and the sender/media factor in all its forms can be observed. Democratization, as a mechanism of progress of the society, must be reflected in this interrelated chain.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Epigenetic/Epigenetic Processes: Refers to the modifications in the genetic system due to persistent changes/cues of the external conditions as informational sources, which do not involve however alterations of the genetic system of species, and are reflected in new features and behaviors of adaptation, transmissible to the next generations (Epigenetics, n.d.; Gaiseanu, 2019e, 2019b).
Cognition: The process/ability to perceive, acquire and store information/knowledge by organism from external and internal sources and to understand/interpret them (Cognition, n.d.).
Proto-Cognition: Proto is used as a prefix in biology and other sciences to express the meaning of primary, first, primitive (Bailey, 2019), so proto-cognition is a primitive/primary cognition experience as a result of the connection to reality of the inferior organisms like the eukaryotic cells, either as mono or multi-cellular organisms (inclusive human), which refers especially to the perception and memory, allowing to explore the surrounding environment (Gaiseanu, 2020d).
Eukaryotic Cell: A unicellular organism with a nucleus enclosed within a nuclear envelope and distinct various organelles with specific functions (Eukaryote, n.d.), and is the basic component of the plants and animals as multicellular organisms, superior on the evolutionary scale to the prokaryotic cell like bacterium, which has not nucleus and organelles (Prokaryote, n.d.), but similar informational functions (Gaiseanu, 2020c).
Proto-Consciousness: Is a primary/primitive form of info-operability (perception/decision) by means of the informational system consisting in seven informational centers, which show similar functions on the entire evolutionary scale of lives, growing in complexity as higher is the development degree (Gaiseanu, 2021e).
Sentience/Cognitive-Sentience: The capacity/ability of human to experience feelings/sensations (Sentience, n.d.) as reactions to the interaction with information, which in the inferior organisms on the evolutionary scale can be also interpreted as internal sensitivity to information (Gaiseanu, 2021f). Cognitive-sentience is the ability to explore reality, involving the informational system of the organism, as a tool of experience and knowledge for the perception/interpretation/understanding of information, according to own criteria and needs for survival (Gaiseanu, 2019a).
Big Data: A computational domain for analysis and systematical extraction of information from too large/complex data sets, which cannot be already processed by the traditional application software (Big data, n.d.), useful also in media analysis and prediction.