THE ROLE OF ELECTRONIC MEDIA IN SHAPING CULTURAL AWARENESS AMONG YOUNG PEOPLE

Abstract

The media represents an influential element in the lives of societies as it is the publisher and the basic promoter of thought and culture, and it actively contributes to the process of forming awareness of individuals along with the family, educational institutions and civil institutions. Indeed, in many countries of the world, it is one of the producers of culture through interaction and mutual human influence, and in recent years, The mass media, especially the electronic media of all kinds, have acquired new dimensions that have increased the strength of their influence on individuals and groups. In addition, the media, as an important social institution in human societies, carries economic, political, and ideological implications. If it does not have the ability to establish the culture and identity of the community, it leads to falsifying awareness and corrupting minds. It must be recognized that the Arab youth in general and the Iraqi youth in particular, the subject of our research, are among the groups most affected by the cultural invasion operations, as a result of the massive knowledge explosion and the development of mass media, especially social networking sites and satellite channels, which represent an important social and cultural variable in the lives of young people. The head of information and learning, one of the sources of awareness-forming processes in the era of media globalization. Through our research, a number of conclusions were reached, the most important of which are: 1. Young people's interests are limited to cultural issues, as the category of interest in cultural issues ranked fourth among their other interests. 2. The respondents (young people) who hold the status of a student were the highest, and they are the most answering groups to the questionnaire, meaning that they represent the most followup group on social networking sites, and this is what the recent statistics showed. 3. It was found that the respondents (young people) started using Facebook pages not long ago. 54. Young people prefer to see the daily news when browsing the Facebook pages. 5. The respondents (young people) agree that Facebook pages are an important source of information on cultural issues in the country. Among the most important recommendations: