Written evidence submitted by Dr Ann Luce, on behalf of Bournemouth University

Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee’s call for evidence on Reality TV

I am a Principal Academic in Journalism and Communication at Bournemouth University. I have been researching in the area of suicide and media for 13 years. I have written several sets of media reporting guidelines for the World Health Organisation, as well as advised governments in Wales and Norway on their suicide prevention strategies. I currently sit on the World Media Task Force for the prevention of suicide. I am research and media lead for the Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group, responsible for programme evaluation and media campaigns. 

I am happy to provide further detail on the information submitted and I am also available to provide oral evidence to the committee.

Who should be responsible for monitoring whether duty of care policies are being applied effectively in the production of reality TV shows?

1. Media influences how mental illness and suicide is conceptualised and practiced in everyday contexts and is responsible for constructing our reality and how we think about the issue of mental illness and suicide.  Suicide is overwhelmingly portrayed as the result of problems and NOT in the context of mental illness, as shown by my research[1]. When suicide occurs, it adversely affects the wider society as well as those immediately bereaved. Reductive and simplistic explanations of suicide are common in media reporting.
2. The UK has an opportunity to be world-leading in best practice in media representations and portrayal of mental health and suicide, but we are falling behind. Australia’s use of Mindframe[2] has fundamentally shifted how Australians engage with the topic of mental health and suicide, to its benefit. The UK needs a set of expected standards on how reality television producers should recruit, portray and support participants on their television programmes. The Government should then expect the media industry to fulfil these, without censoring or impinging on the principle of freedom of speech. Responsible and ethical training of production practices should be required in all secondary and tertiary communication and television/media production programmes in the UK.
3. A national programme or Government task group (moving beyond the basic media work of the Samaritans) supporting safe and ethical media reporting, fictional and ‘reality’ portrayal and communication of suicide and mental health is urgently needed to change the conversation about mental health and suicide in this country. Such a programme or task group would set the tone for how we talk about mental health and suicide, as well as help alleviate the emotional, medical, social and economic costs of suicide in the UK. It is this group that should be responsible for monitoring whether duty of care policies are being applied effectively in the production of reality television shows.

Do the design formats for reality shows put unfair psychological pressure on participants and encourage more extreme behaviour? If so, how?

4. The design formats for reality television shows do place unfair psychological pressure on participants and encourage extreme behaviour.  The structure of such programmes draws on ‘a certain sadistic pleasure in witnessing distress and failure as well as success’[3]. Audiences gauge the authenticity or truthfulness of reality television via emotional realism and personal revelation. This is done via camera monologues, the use of video diaries, and shock-tactic interviews. The audience experiences the pseudo-intimacy of a therapeutic counselling room while also rooting for a working class ‘transformation’.  The audience is also judging the performance of each participant’s emotions and determining whether or not they display and dramatise themselves as deficient enough, eg. are they sufficiently repentant.
5. What happens through the construction of ‘reality’ television is an erosion between the public and private sphere, between a private ‘ordinary’ person and the celebrity, as well as between media (television) and social space (Instagram). The boundaries become blurred. In the aftermath of a reality television programme, participants go back to their ‘ordinary’ lives, but with the boundaries blurred.
6. It is possible that the damage done to participants happens when the filming stops, when the attention is withdrawn, and life allegedly returns to banal ordinariness. Yet, with a 24/7 ‘celebrity’ news cycle, coupled with the unrelenting posts and ‘trolling’ on social media, participants will find it difficult to disentangle from their constructed ‘reality’ and return to their ‘real’ reality[4]. Aftercare plays a critical role in supporting participants in the aftermath of filming, yet it is not a priority embedded within the television industry in this country.  Positive filming experiences happen when those that are filmed are treated as collaborators rather than resources, when participants are fully informed of the intentions of the producer.
7. For the reality television participant, we see a disinhibition effect, where they share secret emotions, fears and wishes, but also can see rude language, harsh criticisms, anger, hatred and even threats[5]. They perform in ways they may not necessarily present in ‘real’ life. This provides the audience with an unethical portrayal of this person, which can lead to unrelenting posts and trolling on social media once they emerge from the constructed situation.  Participants will find it difficult to disentangle from their constructed ‘reality’ and return to their ‘real’ reality.
8. For male participants, there is the added burden of ‘hypermasculine’ portrayals, which reinforce already established discourses in society. Male participants of reality television programmes may not reach out for support in the aftermath of filming, which means the little aftercare that is provided will not be used to its full potential benefit. Aftercare may need to be imposed for a specified amount of time.
9. We know that men do not have a language to talk about mental health. Mental illness carries the weight of stigma within society. In general terms, men are represented in media as ‘hypermasculine’ from birth; whereas mental illness is often viewed as ‘unmasculine’[6]. This discourse of ‘hypermasculinity’ is reinforced in reality television[7], which means participants of such shows, once filming has concluded, may not reach out for support if they are struggling; this may need to be imposed.
10. To be mentally ill in Great Britain today means to be quite passive and ‘womanlike’. For men, this goes against the ‘hypermasculine’ messages that they are bombarded with daily, and therefore, many suffer in silence, do not speak about their mental health challenges, do not seek medical assistance with their mental health, and often see suicide as a way to ‘deal’ with poor mental health, primarily because of the burden and expectations attributed to being male. When this is coupled with the ‘celebrity’ of reality television, it could be considered to have unpleasant consequences.  75% of suicides in the UK are men under the age of 50[8].  75% of those who die by suicide are not known to mental health services within the NHS[9].

What is the future of reality TV of this kind? How does it accord with our understanding of, and evolving attitudes to, mental health?

11. Research shows that reality television, in its claim to ‘realness’ assembles powerful forms of ‘class-making’[10]. Reality Television is about cultural politics; it is concerned with ‘social difference’. Reality television objectifies its participants based on social class.  This form of television, as supported by the academic evidence, targets ‘ordinary people’, the ‘working class’, and uses reality television as a way to entice participants with social mobility. It does so using a deficit model, that ‘these people’ are less than, that they ‘need’ improvement. Participants are tested in multiple ways through objectification and exploitation in the name of entertainment and revenue. At a human level, it is unethical and immoral.
12. While reality television is therefore problematic in many areas, it would be inadvisable to try to create a cause and effect binary when it comes to suicide. A national programme or Government task group would aim to support safe and ethical media reporting, and fictional and ‘reality’ portrayal, including the communication of suicide and mental health to reduce the emotional, medical, social and economic costs of suicide in this country.
13. Additionally, a tougher screening process for participants, determining whether they suffer from mental illness, eg. depression is also needed.

June 2019