How Fantasy Becomes Reality

Information and Entertainment Media in Everyday Life, Revised and Expanded

Karen E. Dill-Shackleford

Research-based approach delivered in a conversational tone.
Addresses how we make meaning from fiction, an emerging area of psychological study.
Takes a broad look at the media landscape, including video games, movies, television, fan fiction, internet culture, and political coverage.

New to this Edition:

The new edition is thoroughly updated and includes a new chapter on fandom.

How Fantasy Becomes Reality

Information and Entertainment Media in Everyday Life, Revised and Expanded

Karen E. Dill-Shackleford

Description

From smartphones to social media, from streaming videos to fitness bands, our devices bring us information and entertainment all day long, forming an intimate part of our lives. Their ubiquity represents a major shift in human experience, and although we often hold our devices dear, we do not always fully appreciate how their nearly constant presence can influence our lives for better and for worse.

In this revised and expanded edition of How Fantasy Becomes Reality, social psychologist Karen E. Dill-Shackleford explains what the latest science tells us about how our devices influence our thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. In engaging, conversational prose, she discusses both the benefits and the risks that come with our current level of media saturation. The wide-ranging conversation explores Avatar, Mad Men, Grand Theft Auto, and Comic Con to address critical issues such as media violence, portrayals of social groups, political coverage, and fandom. Her conclusions will empower readers to make our favorite sources of entertainment and information work for us and not against us.

How Fantasy Becomes Reality

Information and Entertainment Media in Everyday Life, Revised and Expanded

Karen E. Dill-Shackleford

Chapter 1. On Fantasy and Reality
Chapter 2. Fandom, Fantasy, and Reality
Chapter 3. Old and New Media in Everyday Life: From TV to Social Media
Chapter 4. Media Violence
Chapter 5. Representations of Social Groups in Media
Chapter 6. Advertising, Consumerism, and Health
Chapter 7. Media and Identity
Chapter 8. The Social Psychology of Political Coverage
Chapter 9. From the Passenger's Seat to the Driver's Seat
Notes
Bibliography
Index

How Fantasy Becomes Reality

Information and Entertainment Media in Everyday Life, Revised and Expanded

Karen E. Dill-Shackleford

Author Information

Karen E. Dill-Shackleford is a social psychologist who studies the role of media in everyday life. Some of her special areas of interest are the psychology of engagement with narrative, violence and violence prevention, portrayals of race and gender, and fandom.

How Fantasy Becomes Reality

Information and Entertainment Media in Everyday Life, Revised and Expanded

Karen E. Dill-Shackleford

Reviews and Awards

"Our media saturated environment is cluttered with opinions about how the media affects us--or doesn't affect us--in all sorts of ways. It's hard to find a book by someone who really understands the findings in the large and technical media effects literature and can communicate that knowledge to a general audience in a credible and highly engaging manner. Karen Dill-Shackleford accomplished that rare feat in 2009 with How Fantasy Becomes Reality. Now with the media effects literature even larger, Professor Dill-Shackleford has written a second edition of this book which is even more interesting and engaging. This new edition of How Fantasy Becomes Reality is a must read for anyone who wants to learn what is really going on with media effects." --W. James Potter, Professor of Communication, University of California at Santa Barbara; Author of The Eleven Myths of Media Violence

"Reading Karen Dill-Shackleford's revised and expanded How Fantasy Becomes Reality is like thinking through the most pressing, most enduring, and most interesting questions about the role of media in individuals' lives in the company of a really smart and engaging friend. With a humorous and easy-going style, she traces through the perils and pleasures of our media-saturated existence by providing thoughtful, fair, and clear-eyed analysis of oodles of social science data and an uncanny ability to zero directly in on its importance for our daily lives. I'd recommend this book to students, scholars, and engaged citizens alike." --Erica Scharrer, Professor and Chair, Department of Communication, University of Massachusetts Amherst

How Fantasy Becomes Reality

Information and Entertainment Media in Everyday Life, Revised and Expanded

Karen E. Dill-Shackleford

From Our Blog

Barbie evokes suffering in girls, scorn in teens and finally gets reshaped

Scholars have long documented the significance in young people's lives of popular culture ideals. These ideals can come in many forms including fashion models, singers and actresses, video game characters and toys. In the case of dolls, research has revealed that girls form a relationship with favorite dolls in which they develop ideal selves in line with the characteristics of the doll. The dolls are a socializing agent, bringing in the ideals of the larger society to the girl's private life.

Posted on February 19, 2016

Read the blog post