电视真人秀节目外文翻译文献

文献信息：

文献标题：Contention with Reality TV Show: Should reality TV Educate as much as Entertain: Case Study the X-Factor（与电视真人秀节目的竞争：电视真人秀应该兼顾教育性和娱乐性吗？以《X音素》为例）

国外作者：Benjamin Nabutete Abwanzo

文献出处：《Social Science Electronic Publishing》,2016

字数统计：英文2524单词，13536字符；中文4342汉字

外文文献：

Contention with Reality TV Show: Should reality TV Educate as much as Entertain: Case Study the X-Factor

Abstract Technological advances coupled with the development of the ICT have led to massive changes in the media sector, especially the TV. Today, media producers develop different shows including drama, fiction, comedy, and reality TV program to satisfy the needs of their audiences. Recently, reality TV has taken the centre stage of most discussions, with stakeholders trying to find out whether these type of shows can be used for both education and entertainment. This article examines this contention using the TV show X-factor as the referencing point. The result of literature review showed that, theoretically, the possibility of utilizing reality shows to educate and entertain exists if an equilibrium is found between these two factors: education and entertainment. However, in practice it is difficult to find a balance between education and entertainment. This can partially be attributed to viewers opinion on what is entertainment and what is education and because TV producers cannot control the cognition and analytical skills of their viewers.

Keywords: Reality TV, Cognitive Development, Piaget

Introduction

Today’s society has been c haracterised by rapid advances and development of information and communication technology. These advances and development have in turn induced significant changes in the media sector, especially the television, which is deemed as one of the most popular entertainment platforms in the world. People regularly tune onto their television sets to watch or find new content for entertainment. For this reason, the media society has been forced to develop different entertainment programmes, such as fiction, action, drama, comedy, and reality television. These programmes not only seek to entertain and satisfy TV audience, but also ensure TV viewers are educated. One type of programme that has gained popularity in the past few decades is reality TV. According to Lees (2010), the increased popularity of reality TV can be attributed to the fact that it shows real life (factual) events and provides immense entertainment to its viewers.

The common assumption among most people is that today’s audiences lack the capacity to differentiate between fact and fiction, or entertainment and information (Hill, 2005). As such, it becomes very difficult to determine whether reality TV can be used for both entertainment and educational purposes. Murray & Ouellette (2004) stated that some audiences prefer the drama, information, and entertainment provided by reality television, whereas, others hate it. This division among the audiences makes it difficult to determine the ratio of entertainment value to an educative value that could satisfy all the audiences. With such concerns surrounding reality TV, it is essential to explore its features and determine whether entertainment and educational value can be attached to this genre of television. This article examines the contention that realitytelevision should be used for both entertainment and educational purposes using the reality TV show The X-factor as the primary reference point.

An Overview of X-Factor

The X-factor is one of the most popular reality TV shows in the UK that concentrates on finding the best musical talent in the UK region and developing it. The show is a part of a franchise that operates in different countries of the world including the United States, Australia, Germany, and Ukraine. It was created by

Simon Cowell to replace another popular reality TV show called the Pop Idol. The series’ popularity has seen it run for twelve consecutive years in the UK, and the producers are expecting it to continue in the foreseeable future.

In the UK and other countries that the X-factors airs, the show operates on a very simple premise, which entails aggregating musicians with potential and training them to ensure they achieve their potential while competing with other contestants (Merriman, 2015; Telegrah Reporter, 2015). The contestants have to pass through an audition stage before they can be selected to take part in the competition. A panel of three judges is usually present during the auditions to determine, who among the thousands of applicants would move to the next stage of selection known as the boot camp (Joshi, 2015). The contestants who pass this phase are awarded a place in the x-factor show, where they will display their musical talents to millions of viewers. The producers then allow the television viewers to vote for their favourite contestant.

Three of the contestants with the least vote are usually in danger of elimination. As such, they are sometimes at risk of being eliminated (Travis, 2015).

Reality Television Target Audience

Although different reality TV programmes are often created to target different audiences, the X- factor was initially created as broad family-friendly series that targeted teens and adults, whowere engrossed in the notion of pop culture. As such, the age of the target audience ranged between teens aged 16 and had no upper age limit. Currently, however, the show’s popularity coupled with its family-friendly nature prompted the producers to lower the barriers of age restriction and accept audiences and contestants aged 14. In spite of the producers and the television networks placing restrictive viewership age on this show, the X-factor has turned out to be an all-inclusive family show, which all family members can watch to get entertainment and sometimes gain information.

The fact that the X-factor is available to different kinds of audiences has raised questions among scholars and TV producers on whether the show can be used as an educational tool as well as an entertainment show. It is imperative that the audience is

divided into different groups and to determine how each category of the audience would process the educational, and the entertainment content provided to know whether the show could be educational as well as entertaining. This paper utilizes Piaget’s (1969) cognitive development stages to categorize the different kind of audiences who watch the X-factor. Even though the show targets an audience between the age of 14 and no upper limit (Andrews, 2014), there is a common assumption that the age of the audience watching the X-factor may be as low as seven and no upper limit.

According to Piaget’s theory of developmental stages (Shaffer & Kipp, 2014), this kind of audience can only be categorised into two main stages: concrete audience, and formal operation audience. Piaget bases his developmental stages on cognition. For this reason, this classification provides a good platform for determining how the different audiences would process or comprehend the content supplied by the X-factor.

Utilizing Reality TV to Entertain

Reality TV has never been short of entertainment as viewers usually expect to gain real life evidence for their beliefs and practices from watching reality TV. Prior to reality TV, television audiences had attached a great interest in documentaries and the News. Research by television regulatory bodies in the UK showed that over 90 percent of TV audience were interested in watching the News, and another 90 percent confirmed that they believed the television was accurate in delivering the News (Hill, 2005). The interest attached to the News and documentaries prompted film producers to create reality TV shows that could entertain and provide information. In addition to this, scholars believe that that, humans are intrinsically wired to believe what they see than what they do not ( Biel & Peske, 2009; Lance, 2013; Ranky, 2004). As such, they have a great of trust and confidence on audio-visual documentation than any othermedia. It is this confidence that film producers utilize to deliver entertainment to its viewers. Reality television exploits the appreciative nature of man and the need to satisfy personal desires the use these aspects to provide entertainment. Farrand (2016)

supports this idea when he asserts that humans are naturally appreciative of good things and have an intrinsic desire to attain self- gratification.

The X-factor relies on human’s desire to enjoy music as well as the trust the place on audio- visual documentation of content. Besides this, the show banks on human’s attribute of self- gratification to provide entertainment. Every week viewers tune in to enjoy the music and to determine which of the contestants is likely to win the prize money. The entertainment value is derived from the satisfaction of predicting a winner or from the surprise that the contestants provide on a weekly basis. The question of level entertainment acquired from the show is dependent on the classification of the audience but rather on the tastes and preferences of the audience. Different audiences are naturally structured or nurtured to enjoy different tastes in music, or performance. For this reason, the age of the viewer will not determine his or her enjoyment levels. The degree of satisfaction would depend on tastes and preferences, which are usually affected by nature and nurture (Coll, et al., 2014).

Information Dissemination via Reality TV

The educational value of reality TV is always embedded in the entertainment aspect. This is because the majority of the television audiences are more interested in entertainment than education (Quaal & Martin, 1968). Different stakeholders expect exposure to reality TV shows to provide information and entertainment. To attain this expectation, producers disguise education as entertainment. For example, TV shows like Survivor UK, are entertainingprogrammes use to educate people about survival. The educational value is not apparent. The producers manage to pass information without the audience realising that they are being educated. Reality TV producers recognize that people in different developmental stages have different capacities to interpret and decipher educative information (Bryant, 2007; Kirkorian, et al., 2008). For this reason, they develop content based on their target audience. Reality TV shows that target a broad audience base often factors in the impact of guardians on cognitive development and understanding. As such, they often rate their shows PG, which indicates that parental guidance would assist the younger audiences to grasp the

information disseminated by the show.

The X-factor educational value is limited as the show barely deals with the educational aspect of the society. Nevertheless, for music and art students the show may be an excellent source of information. This is because after the performance of every contestant, a panel of professional and experienced judges is allowed to provide constructive criticism (Leyfield, 2015). The critique by these judges is usually educative to students of arts and music. While the educational value of this critique may be obvious to the audience in the formal operation class, it may surpass the thinking capacity of some audiences in the concrete group. In such cases, guidance from an individual with a good understanding of the show is necessary. Providing proper council in the form of micromanagement or setting learning objectives for the audience in the concrete group might ensure that they absorb the much-needed information irrespective of their age.

For adults, embedding educational content in the entertainment aspect of the X-factor may be ideal. This is because adult audiences have been known to possess two major characteristics, which enhance their learning capabilities. Firstly, this group has a well-developed capacity toreason hypothetically. Atkinson, et al. (2005) insinuate that adults have hypotheticodeductive reasoning skills. This implies that when adults are faced with an issue, they have the capacity to formulate theories, which provides all possible scenarios that are likely to occur if they take an action in the real world (Higgs, 2008; Holyoak & Morrison, 2007; Vargios, 2007). Secondly, adults in the formal operation stage are capable of analysing and synthesizing the theories they formulate and then determining their logical validity without acting on them (Overton, 2013; Sadock, et al., 2007). These two attributes ensure that adult audiences can differentiate between entertainment, drama, and education. Similarly, adults could find it easy to decipher any educational information in the X-factor show, thus increasing their knowledge.

Implication of Using Reality TV for Entertainment and Education Reality TV has mass appeal (DeV olld, 2016; Murray & Ouellette, 2009). Popular

series, like ‘I’m a Celebrity’ in the UK attracting up to 50 percent of the total market share. This implies that approximately half of the population in the UK tuned in to watch these series. Hill (2005) propounded that attracting a large audience requires a reality show to be all rounded and entertaining. Creating an all rounded reality TV program is usually very difficult because the target audiences (Joshi, 2015), for most programmes, have different tastes, opinions, and preferences. Wilson (2008) believes that media experts should find an equilibrium between drama and reality, as well as education and information to ensure that audience could derive both education. Reality TV can be one of the best entertainment and educational platform if the right equilibrium is achieved. This is because its ability to capture the masses will ensure that a large number of people receives the intended educational message and enjoy themselves in the process.

The television show like the X-factor, which has a broad audience base, is an even better prospect for delivering information owing to the fact that it captures the interest of two classes of audience. This implies that the show would provide a platform for educating, children, the youth, and adults who fall into these two categories. In spite of these merits, utilizing Reality TV to disseminate information may be disadvantageous because the majority of the audience watch these shows with the aim of being entertained rather than educated. For this reason, it becomes very difficult for the audience to be analytical when watching, thus the educative aspect of a show may go unnoticed even if the audience has the cognitive ability to think structurally, logically, or analytically. Striking a balance between education and entertainment remains the biggest challenge to reality TV producers. In addition to this, finding a way convince the audience to be analytical while watching is also very difficult. Due to these two reasons, it is very difficult to determine whether reality TV can be an effective apparatus for educating and entertaining.

Conclusion

The incursion of reality TV into the mainstream media oversaw the rise of debates on whether this form of television programming can be used to entertain and

educate. On one side, some stakeholders believe that reality TV is an entertainment tool rather than an educational tool. On the other side of this argument, some individuals believe that reality TV can be a source of both entertainment and education. While both these camps advance relevant points, an analysis of the show X-factor, UK shows that reality TV can be both educational and entertaining. Despite the different views, this analysis shows that it is imperative that the producers of the show find an equilibrium between entertainment and information in order to keep the audience interestedwhile educating them in the process. Theoretically, it is possible to achieve this equilibrium. However, in practice it is very difficult to actually balance between entertainment and education. As such, it remains to be seen whether reality TV could be an effective educational and entertainment tool. Currently, it can be assumed that reality TV can serve as both an entertainment tool as well as an educational tool. However, this will be dependent on the cognitive capacity of the audience.

中文译文：

与电视真人秀节目的竞争：

电视真人秀应该兼顾教育性和娱乐性吗？以《X音素》为例

摘要技术进步加上信息和通信技术的发展，导致了媒体部门，特别是电视节目的巨大变化。如今，媒体制作人开发了不同的节目，包括戏剧、故事、喜剧和真人秀节目，以满足观众的需求。最近，电视真人秀节目已经成为大多数讨论的核心内容，利益相关者试图了解这类节目是否可以用于教育和娱乐。本文使用电视节目《X音素》作为参考点来探讨这一观点。文献综述的结果表明，从理论上讲，如果在教育和娱乐这两个因素之间找到平衡点，就存在利用真人秀进行教育和娱乐的可能性。但在实践中，很难在教育和娱乐之间找到平衡。这可以部分归因于观众对什么是娱乐和什么是教育的看法，因为电视制作人无法控制观众的认

知和分析能力。

关键词：真人秀，认知发展，皮亚杰

引言

当今社会的特点是信息和通信技术的快速进步和发展。这些进步和发展反过来又引起了媒体界的巨大变化，特别是电视，它被认为是世界上最受欢迎的娱乐平台之一。人们经常打开电视，观看或寻找新的娱乐内容。因此，传媒界被迫开发出不同的娱乐节目，如故事、活动、戏剧、喜剧、真人秀等。这些节目不仅要取悦和满足电视观众，还要确保电视观众受到教育。在过去几十年中流行的一种节目是电视真人秀。根据利斯（2010）的观点，电视真人秀的日益普及可以归因于它展示了真实的生活（事实）事件，并为观众带来了非常多的娱乐性。

大多数人普遍认为，今天的观众缺乏区分事实和虚构、娱乐和知识的能力（希尔，2005）。因此，很难确定电视真人秀节目是否可以用于娱乐和教育的目的。默里和莱特（2004）指出，有些观众喜欢电视真人秀提供的剧本、知识和娱乐，而其他人则感到讨厌。观众之间的这种划分使得很难确定可以满足所有观众的娱乐价值和教育价值之间的比例。由于围绕电视真人秀始终存在这些困惑，因此探索其特点，并确定娱乐和教育价值是否可以附加到这种电视类型中，就显得十分必要。本文利用电视真人秀节目“X音素”作为主要参考点，探讨了电视真人秀应用于娱乐和教育目的的观点。

《X音素》概述

《X音素》是最受欢迎的电视真人秀节目之一，它寻找英国地区最好的音乐人才并塑造他们。该节目是世界不同国家，包括美国、澳大利亚、德国和乌克兰经营的专营权的一部分。它是由西蒙·考威尔创作的，以取代另一个流行的电视真人秀节目“流行偶像”。该系列节目已经在英国连续12年获得高人气，制片人期待它在可预见的将来继续下去。

在英国和其他国家，《X音素》的播放，这个节目的运作需要一个非常简单的前提，即聚集有潜力的音乐家并训练他们，以确保他们在与其他参赛者竞争时发挥潜力（梅里曼，2015；电报记者，2015）。参赛者必须经过试镜才能被选中

参加比赛。在试镜期间，通常会有一个由三名评委组成的小组，以确定在成千上万的申请人中谁将会进入被称为新兵训练营的下一阶段（乔希，2015）。通过这一阶段的参赛者将在《X音素》系列节目中获得一席之地，他们将向数百万观众展示他们的音乐才华。制片人随后允许电视观众投票选出最喜欢的参赛者。

获得投票最少的三名参赛者通常有被淘汰的危险。因此，他们有时会面临被淘汰的危险（特拉维斯，2015）。

电视真人秀节目的目标观众

虽然不同的真人秀节目往往是针对不同的受众，但《X音素》最初是作为一个广泛的家庭友好系列，针对青少年和成年人，他们热衷于流行文化。因此，《X 音素》的目标受众的年龄介于16岁之间，没有年龄上限。然而，目前，该节目的受欢迎程度加上家庭友善的性质，促使制片人降低了年龄限制的门槛，并接受了14岁的观众和参赛者。尽管制片人和电视网络在该节目上限制了观众年龄，但《X音素》已经成为一个包罗万象的家庭节目，所有的家庭成员都可以观看，并从中获得娱乐性，有时还会获得知识。

对于不同类型的受众来说，《X音素》都是适合的，这一事实在学者和电视制作人中引起了质疑：该节目在作为一档娱乐节目的同时，是否又可以作为一种教育工具？必须将观众分成不同的群体，并确定每个类别的观众如何处理教育，以及提供的娱乐内容，从而了解节目是否具有教育性和娱乐性。本文利用皮亚杰（1969）的认知发展阶段理论，对观看《X音素》的不同类型的观众进行了分类。尽管该节目的目标受众的年龄介于14岁之间，没有上限（安德鲁斯，2014），但人们普遍认为，观看《X音素》的观众的年龄可能低至七岁，没有上限。

根据皮亚杰的发展阶段理论（谢弗和基普，2014），这类观众只能被分为两个主要阶段：具体运算阶段的观众和形式运算阶段的观众。皮亚杰的发展阶段是以认识为基础的。因此，该分类为确定不同受众如何处理或理解由《X音素》提供的内容提供了一个良好的平台。

利用电视真人秀提供娱乐

电视真人秀从来没有缺乏娱乐性，因为观众通常希望通过观看电视真人秀，