Social Class

Social Class and Social Status

The first problem to be addressed is the definition of social class itself. In one of the few in-depth analyses of social class and media use among children and adolescents, Rosengren and Windahl (1989) noted that it is possible to trace operationalizations of the concept to the work of either Karl Marx or Max Weber. In the Marxist view, the economic structure of a society divides people into different classes, a class being composed of those occupying comparable places in the system of production. Weber also defined social classes in economic terms but based his definition on the means at a person's disposal to operate in any given market. To the notion of class, Weber added that of status, referring to the social prestige assigned to a person by others. Thus, in this tradition, the term social (or socioeconomic) status is more commonly used. However, social class and social status should not be regarded as mutually exclusive concepts. Whereas social class may be seen as defining the main socioeconomic framework within which mass media use takes place, social status prescribes more precise ways in which the media are used by different status groupings.

In mass communication research, there has been no uniformity in the use of these concepts. The Marxist variant is found mostly in European research, whereas the Weberian perspective, although also frequently employed in Europe, has left a deeper mark on American research. As a result of this lack of uniformity, various indicators of class or status have been employed, such as income, occupational status, and level of education.

In addition to Marx and Weber, Pierre Bourdieu's concept of cultural capital has also been applied to the social foundations of media use. Cultural capital is defined as symbolic wealth socially regarded as worthy of being sought and possessed. According to this theory, the cultural capital children receive from home will affect their chances of success at school and thereby also the opportunities for later achieving status and a favorable position within the process of production. Cultural capital has also been found to be directly related to amounts and types of media use. A person's level of education has been found to be a good indicator of social status, thus conceived.

Rosengren and Windahl also stressed the need to differentiate between the concepts of class of origin and class of destination because the cogency of these contexts varies across the life span. Thus, whereas the social class of children is defined by that of their parents (class of origin), that of adults tends to be based on their own educational and occupational achievement (class of destination). For adolescents, the situation is more equivocal because they find themselves in a transitional context. As they grow older, the influence of their class of origin steadily diminishes; as they approach the end of their educational careers, they become increasingly aware of their probable destination in the status hierarchy, including whether or not their trajectory is socially mobile in an upward or downward direction. Via the process of anticipatory socialization (the process of adopting the values and orientations of a group to which one aspires but does not yet belong, with the aim of aiding one's transition into membership of that group), this perceived future can affect current behavior such as media uses and preferences. These indeterminate and transitory elements of adolescents' social class location may at least partially account for the weak correlations with adolescents' media use often reported in the literature.

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