RESEARCHING THE INFLUENCE OF THE CREOLIZED MEDIA TEXTS ABOUT PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES ON THE RECIPIENTS

PESQUISANDO A INFLUÊNCIA DOS TEXTOS MIDIÁTICOS “CRIOLIZADOS” RELACIONADOS ÀS PESSOAS COM DEFICIÊNCIA SOBRE OS RECEPTORES

ESTUDIO DE LA INFLUENCIA EN LOS RECEPTORES DE LOS TEXTOS MEDIÁTICOS “CREOLIZADOS” SOBRE LAS PERSONAS CON DISCAPACIDAD

ABSTRACT

This research is dedicated to the investigation of the influence that the creolized media texts about persons with disabilities exert on the recipients, with an emphasis on the biological, socio-psychological, and media components. The author’s definition of the notion of “creolized media text” was suggested based on a comprehensive study of the papers dealing with the topic of “creolization”. The main task of creating creolized media texts was described, in their verbal and iconic components and attempt to have a positive emotional influence on the readers. The survey revealed the following: within the biological block, the respondents aged from 16 to 19 are more distant from persons with disabilities, perceiving them with a certain disgust, while the respondents aged from 20 to 23 tend to be more tolerant. According to the analysis of the socio-psychological block, the respondents understand that persons with disabilities have every right to be productive members of society; however, they are not ready for direct communication and collaboration. Nevertheless, the analysis of the media block results showed a positive tendency in attitudes toward persons with disabilities owing to journalistic texts, which combine images and text. Therefore, the use of creolized media texts promotes a positive tendency and changes in improving the attitudes of persons without disabilities regarding persons with disabilities in Ukraine.

Keywords
Creolized text; People with disabilities; Recipient

RESUMO

Esta pesquisa é dedicada à investigação da influência que os textos midiáticos “criolizados” relacionados às pessoas com deficiência exercem sobre os receptores, com ênfase nos componentes biológicos, sociopsicológicos e midiáticos. A própria definição do autor da noção de “texto midiático criolizado” foi sugerida com base em um estudo abrangente dos artigos que tratam do tema da “criolização”. A principal tarefa da criação de textos mediáticos “criolizados” foi descrita nos seus componentes verbais e icônicos e na tentativa de ter uma influência emocional positiva sobre os leitores. A pesquisa revelou o seguinte: dentro do bloco biológico, os pesquisados entre 16 e 19 anos estão mais distantes das pessoas com deficiências, percebendo-as com certa repulsa, enquanto os pesquisados entre 20 e 23 anos tendem a ser mais tolerantes. De acordo com a análise do bloco sociopsicológico, os pesquisados compreendem que pessoas com deficiência têm todo o direito a serem membros produtivos da sociedade; contudo, elas não estão preparadas para a comunicação e colaboração diretas. Apesar disso, a análise dos resultados dos bloqueios mediáticos mostrou uma tendência positiva nas atitudes em relação às pessoas com deficiência devido aos conteúdos jornalísticos, que combinam imagens e textos. Assim, a utilização de textos mediáticos “criolizados” promove uma tendência positiva e mudanças na melhoria das atitudes das pessoas sem deficiência em relação às pessoas com deficiência na Ucrânia.

Palavras-chave
Textos criolizados; Pessoas com deficiência; Receptores

RESUMEN

Esta investigación está dedicada al estudio de la influencia que ejercen en los receptores los textos mediáticos creolizados relativos a las personas con discapacidad; con énfasis en los componentes biológicos, sociopsicológicos y mediáticos. La definición del autor de la noción de “texto mediático creolizado” se propone sobre la base de un estudio comprensivo de los artículos que tratan el tema de la “creolización”. Se describe la principal tarea en la creación de textos mediáticos creolizados, considerando sus componentes verbales e icónicos, así como el intento de ejercer una influencia emocional positiva en los lectores. La encuesta reveló lo siguiente: dentro del bloque biológico, los encuestados de 16 a 19 años están más distantes de las personas con discapacidad, percibiéndolas con cierto disgusto, mientras que los encuestados de 20 a 23 años tienden a ser más tolerantes. Según el análisis del bloque sociopsicológico, los encuestados entienden que las personas con discapacidad tienen todo el derecho a ser miembros productivos de la sociedad; sin embargo, consideran que no están preparadas para la comunicación y la colaboración directas. Por otro lado, el análisis de los resultados de los medios de comunicación mostró una tendencia positiva en las actitudes hacia las personas con discapacidad, debido a que los textos periodísticos combinan imágenes y texto. Por lo tanto, el uso de textos mediáticos creolizados promueve una tendencia positiva y cambios en la mejora de las actitudes de las personas sin discapacidad con respecto a las personas con discapacidad en Ucrania.

Palabras clave
Texto creolizado; Personas con discapacidad; Receptor

1 Topicality of the research

Verbal and iconic information coexist within the media texts. Combining these elements into a unified semantic unit creates a creolized text. Today, the peculiarities of how creolized journalistic texts function have not been fully investigated, nor have the functions of visual elements and their influence on recipients. With the help of creolized texts, journalists can rivet users’ attention, concentrating it on the semantic structure of the texts. Lately, this approach has been used by journalists who write about the life of persons with disabilities.

Moreover, the authors started to focus on the achievements of persons with disabilities, and this raises their status in society. An adequate combination of visual and verbal components plays an important role in this process, as its complexity can make an impact on the reader. Journalistic writing skill determines the accuracy and vividness of the main hero description that in the end can affect the reader’s consciousness, or how the reader might imagine the described person.

In other words, it is important to analyze the creolized media texts about persons with disabilities to find out some functions of visual elements; to investigate the cooperation of verbal and nonverbal components within an article; and to consider the influence the components have on readers, which determines the topicality of the chosen topic.

2 Analysis of literature sources on the research topic

The study of the topic of creolized texts is exclusively carried out by Russian and Ukrainian scientists. In 1990, Sorokin and Tarasov (1990) proposed the term “creolized texts” to denote texts “whose texture consists of two inhomogeneous parts”. Thus, there are three understandings of the term “creolization”: “general”, “linguistic”, and “textual”. There are few works in which the creolization of the text is investigated, and these works are mainly linguistic. For example, the well-known Russian researcher Elena Anisimova drew attention to the fact that, along with verbal means, iconic means (photography, drawing, caricature, etc.) are used, as well as means of other semiotic codes (font, color). She grades texts according to the degree of cohesion of their verbal and non-verbal components: homogeneous verbal texts – paralinguistically active texts – texts with partial creolization – texts with full creolization.

Following the example of Anisimova, many Russian and Ukrainian linguists in domestic publications and abroad are trying to highlight different aspects of this issue. For example, the Ukrainian linguist Kuznietsova (2010, pp.141–145) devoted her research to the topic: “The role of the creolized text in Dave Barry’s comic idiodiscourse”.

Also, a conditional synonym for the concept of “text creolization” can be defined as “illustrative text”. It is in the field of illustrative text, including media text, that there are developments of international scholars who did not focus on the content of the creolized text, but on illustration as an additional, accompanying element and its functions when writing media texts. So, for example, the authors of the article “Image Versus Text: How Newspaper Reports Affect Evaluations of Political Candidates”, analyzed the degree of influence of images in the text on the level of their acceptance by voters (Boomgaarden et al., 2016). This study is relevant to our study, as it also represents the impact of the illustrations used in the text on the recipients.

It is also important to pay attention to the research called “The counteractive illustration and its metalanguage” in which authors also examine the role and influence of illustrations on readers only from a negative point of view. The importance of this lies in the fact that non-standard approaches to the study of literature about people with disabilities in one category of readers give positive emotions, and in another category, the negative.

Equally important research presented in the English-speaking scientific community is the article “The Media Text in Virtual Space”, which focuses on the fact that: “The intensive development of electronic and audio-visual media, computer technologies, globalization in the information space” requires a rethinking of approaches not only in creating texts but also in their illustrative content. Also interesting and no less valuable work in the field of illustration of media texts is the article: “Iconographic Analysis of Media Texts on Media Literacy Education Classes”. The author of the work described the reactions of students to illustrated media texts, as well as the degree of influence of illustrations on the perception of the text as a whole, focusing on the fact that it is the use of illustrations that further determines the recipient’s attitude to the content of the text as a whole (Abisheva et al, 2016, pp.3–20).

In the context of this literature review, the study: “Textual Images and Visual Texts” (Boomgaarden et al., 2016, pp.2529–2555) is also worth mentioning. Comparative Languages which focuses on the analysis of the language of text illustrations, as well as the impact of these texts on consumers. The researcher consonant confirms in the conclusions of the article that the graphic aspect of the text (creolization) in some cases has more weight than the text itself since it can overnight change the attitude of readers to the “object” described in the text.

Thus, it can be concluded that international researchers are engaged in research on illustrative media texts, but they do not use the full scope of developments of Ukrainian-speaking and Russian-speaking scientists in the field of text creolization as such. Therefore, using the developments of Ukrainian, Russian and foreign researchers, we focus our attention not on studies of the phenomenon of creolization, but more on the influence of creolized media texts about people with disabilities on recipients.

However, we are more interested in the area of journalistic research. So, such scientists as O. Korda, A. Adzinova (Adzinova, 2007, pp.60–63), A. Bernaczkaya (Bernaczkaya, 2000, pp.104–110), and many others were mainly engaged in the study of the specifics of the use of creolized texts in the field of journalism. They studied the current state and problems of studying non-traditional semiotically complicated texts, paid attention to the specifics and peculiarities of the implementation of creolized texts, namely, to the text categories of integrity, coherence, modality, temporality, locality, imagery, and much more. However, the closest to the topic of our research are the works of Golovina (1986), Vashunina (2016), Alekseev (1999). These scientists studied the influence of creolized texts on the recipient, namely, individual elements of the creolized text (images, font, colors, captions), and tried to determine the role of these texts in the consolidation and dissemination of national and gender stereotypes in modern society.

However, it is worth noting that among the authors’ works mentioned in this research and other scientific papers, there are no studies devoted to the topic of people with disabilities, more specifically the influence of creolized texts about them on the reader. Namely, journalistic articles, notes in the mass media about the life and work of people with disabilities are most often creolized. Therefore, this study focuses on the influence of creolized media texts about people with disabilities on recipients, since this issue has not been addressed in domestic nor foreign studies.

Finally, we would like to emphasize that in the modern information space, it is rather difficult to be noticed and heard, and therefore we consider O. Korda’s opinion about the so-called demand for information to be fair. According to her, this is

[…] such a quality of information that, for its implementation, requires that the text that carries it be first noticed and then perceived in semantic integrity. It is the visual component that makes the content of the text more vivid, more emotionally colored, which not only qualitatively changes modern journalism but also makes the behavior of the media audience change.

(Korda, 2013, p.12).

In this context, it is extremely important to depict a person with a disability as such, who can exist to be independent in society.

3 Key terminology and content of the topic “creolized media text”

For the first time, the definition of the notion “creolized text” was used by Russian scholars Sorokin and Tarasov (1990): “… these are texts which structure consists of two nonhomogeneous parts: verbal (language/speech) and nonverbal (belongs to other sign systems than natural language) ones” (Sorokin & Tarasov, 1990, p.180). According to Anisimova (2003) it is a “special lingo-visual phenomenon, a text in which verbal and nonverbal components create a visual, structural, semantic, and functional unity that ensures its comprehensive pragmatic influence on the addressee”. Among the visual components the most common are:

• picture + caption/subtitles (posters, graffiti, cartoons);

• set of pictures + accompanying captions/subtitles (comics, albums);

• verbal text + pictures/pictures without accompanying captions/subtitles (a model typical of postcards, many literary texts);

• main verbal text + pictures/pictures with accompanying captions/subtitles (a model typical of newspaper and advertising, scientific, and popular scientific texts) (Anisimova, 2003).

Moreover, one of the researchers, D. Mukhutdinova, adds text layout means (fonts, colors, iconic printed characters, kerning, line spacing, etc.), explanation graphics and diagrams, illustrations, multimedia elements (infographics, photographs, videos, audio tracks) (Mukhutdinova, 2017, p.368).

O. Pojmanova suggests differentiating the creolized texts from the correlation of the volume of information transmitted by different signs, and the role of the image. She distinguishes them as follows:

• Repetitive (the image mainly repeats a verbal text, full repetition is not possible due to the nature of the signs typical of different sign systems);

• Additive (the image brings major additional information);

• Selective (the image “underlines” a certain aspect of verbal information, which volume exceeds the volume of iconic information);

• Oppositive (the content of the image contradicts verbal information, which serves as a good basis for comic effect);

• Integrative (the image is embedded in or completed by a verbal text in the interest of sharing information);

• Image-centric (the image has a leading role, while the verbal part only explains and specifies it) (Pojmanova, 1997).

The main task when studying creolized texts is to find out the connection between verbal and iconic components of the text. Depending on the level of that connection, E. Anisimova distinguishes three types of creolized texts, which are:

• Texts with zero creolization (the image is absent and does not influence the text layout);

• Texts with partial creolization (the image accompanies the verbal part, but remains independent enough);

• Texts with complete creolization (the image and the verbal component can exist only together) (Anisimova, 2003).

Based on the above-mentioned, let us emphasize that the existing definitions of “text creolization” do not apply completely to the notion studied in the “creolized media texts” research. Moreover, such a definition has not been found in the literature. Therefore, we suggest using the term “creolized media text”. It may be defined as a mass media text which, with the help of visual and verbal components, acts as a semantic unity, and highlights socially significant issues, aimed at influencing the development of the recipients’ thoughts, inducing them to take important (specific) actions. The reason for coining a new notion is connected to the fact that today, the “creolized media text” is the main source of information about people having a disability in Ukraine. Justification of the aforementioned notion is due to the fact that the analyzed studies do not focus on: the social significance (component), the combination of visual and verbal components to talk about social issues, nor the lack impact of visual and verbal elements of the media text on the recipients’ emotions and actions.

Let us note that there is a different type of connection between verbal and iconic parts. E. Anisimova defines it as relations of mutual complementation and dependency. Relations of mutual complementation mean that an image is understandable without words and can function independently: a verbal commentary serves as a supplement, it describes the image, repeating its information. Relations of mutual dependency mean that an image is dependent on a text, which determines its interpretation: the meaning of the image is not clear, it depends on a verbal part, and the text plays the main role, because the message may be misinterpreted without it (Anisimova, 2003).

Such creolized texts are often met in the mass media. Most of them are socially significant messages that prevail over other types of texts: they are the so-called media texts. The definition of this notion is provided on the website of the Fund for Information Policy Development, where it is defined as “a work of informational character or a piece of fiction created for broadcasting by mass media (articles, movies, radio/TV shows, etc.)” (Kuznietsova, 2010, p.141).

We find O. Chaikovska’s definition to be the aptest. According to her, the media text is “an integrative, multilevel text that combines into a communicative unity different semiotic codes (verbal, non-verbal, media), and demonstrates openness at the semantic, compositional-structural, and semiotic levels” (Chaikovska, 2014, pp.225–230). The most important feature of a media text is its diversity, as it distinguishes a media text from a regular text. According to Chicherina (2008, p.26), it is “a combination of heterogeneous verbal, visual, additive, audiovisual, or other components within the unified semantic space of the text”.

On the internet, the media text undergoes a certain transformation; we can notice that the lines between verbal, audiovisual, and visual elements are blurred. The users perceive it as a unity: this is where everything, including a color layout, fonts, a verbal component, and its correlation, with an illustration or infographics, plays a role. Lukina (2005) says the following about their role: “A media illustration, that attracts the user’s attention, helps retranslate the traffic into the news portal on which it was posted. The majority of modern periodicals use infographics – a form of information visualization, a part of the multimedia news story”.

In each case journalists do their best in order to attract readers’ attention, to inform them, to show their attitude toward the event, to have an influence on a person’s emotions and feelings; they encode information to be decoded by the users so that they can understand the author’s intention. In this case, journalists should focus on the achievements of persons with disabilities (social component), rather than on their disabilities. Chulanova (2012, pp.92–97) notices that

[…] a reader is always viewed as a social personality that is characterized by specific psychology, has their own opinion and understanding of every event described by the author. The process of decoding the meaning of a message and understanding the general content of a text is completely connected with speech activity and mental processes of a reader, who is the main component in the triad ‘author-text-reader’. It is the reader who is in the focus of this scheme being opposed to two other elements of the communication chain.

A combination of verbal and nonverbal components simplifies understanding a certain message. Today, a visual component not only illustrates a verbal part but also conveys a specific meaning to the message, i.e. it becomes part of its semantics. Because images can influence people’s moods and perceptions of information, it is important to highlight their aesthetic influence on the recipients. At the same time, a person evaluates a certain piece of information that has a specific impact on his/her behavior and attitude toward persons with disabilities. That is why, according to Shaker (2017), the inseparability of verbal and nonverbal elements, both on structural and semantic levels, is essential.

Therefore, the creolized media texts should be viewed on three levels, which will give us a comprehensive understanding of what a journalist wanted to convey and what a reader could understand. These are lexical, syntactical, and compositional levels of analysis. The lexical level includes studying the specific features of lexis used by persons with disabilities, or about persons with disabilities and meant for a wide audience, as well as the peculiarities of its usage in the creolized media texts in the modern Ukrainian information space.

According to Shaker (2017), this is “studying the peculiarities of the usage of lexis aimed at creating a positive or negative image of an object”. On the syntactic level, an emphasis is placed on the peculiarities of usage of sentences, syntactic constructions in the creolized texts under investigation. According to Kyjak-Redkovych (2008, p.188), compositional level means “determining the pragmatic force that is provided by the combination of a small-size text and an image”.

A multimedia story about the Paralympian Viktor Didukh is a good example; it can be found by the following reference: (Mazur et al., n.d.). The authors of this project are O. Tropotiaha, E. Kryzhanivskyi, Ye. Mazur. It should be mentioned that the life stories of famous people are most often told with the help of this genre because it enables using several multimedia visual elements by inserting them into the narrative part of the journalistic text. A Byelorussian scholar O. Gradyushko (2015, p.45) also says: “In the modern media space, creolization of texts prevails (…). Thus, in this context a new format of content visualization known as ‘long-form journalism’ deserves special attention”; this format consists in a long story with visual effect. Making layouts for these stories is possible due to such multimedia platforms as Tilda Publishing. This instrument allows for different combinations of text and visual components.

Viktor Didukh learned to play table tennis in his childhood and devoted a great deal of his time to training. He lost his leg at the height of his career, but it neither broke him down nor stopped him: on the contrary, he became stronger and tougher. Quite impressive is his optimistic attitude to this situation: “In 2012 my leg had to be amputated (…). I was given a choice – either to do it now, or in a few months. I said: ‘Amputate it now, for me not to suffer’. They amputated my leg, my wound healed, and in 5 months I had my first prosthesis made and won the first Paralympic European Championship” (Mazur et al., n.d.).

This text is combined with an image showing Viktor Didukh, but without his face: the focus is on his prosthetic leg and, near him there is one more prosthesis, with which he partakes in sports training. Verbal and nonverbal parts are interconnected: they act as a semantic unity. This text features complete creolization (this is the case when an image and a text cannot exist separately); without text, we would not be able to understand whose photo it is, and who is being referred to. In this media text, the image is dependent on the text, the verbal comment plays the main role, and without it, the meaning of the message may be misinterpreted.

It may be noted that the text component is characterized by both stylistically neutral and stylistically marked lexical units on several images. It goes without saying that, stylistically neutral words create a basis for everything, including this media text; for instance: “the Ukrainian national team”, “the European Championship”, “leg”, “tumor”, “surgery”, “coach”, etc. Based on functional styles, stylistically marked words may be divided into colloquial words: words used in the advertising style, words used in the works of fiction, and words used in the official style. The advertising style, typical of the mass communication language, synthesizes a combination of the above-mentioned styles. This can be seen in that multimedia story. According to the data provided by the Ukrainian Language Official Website, colloquial lexis has the following characteristics:

1. explicit emotive-evaluating positive and negative shades of meaning (negative meaning is conveyed in the following words: tough, overtrained, undertrained, invalid, rival, foe, punks, emotionally difficult, angry, poor, apathy, torments; the number of words with a positive meaning is way lower: happy, glad, beautiful, pride);

2. words that are not typically used in the literary language, for instance: to be fed up with something, threw, pulled, dawdled, waved, started a trend, tough cookie, etc. Moreover, among the main linguistic means used in the advertising style, the following ones are distinguished: figurative language, periphrasis, tropes, using sports terminology in figurative meaning, etc., for example: to brandish a racket, sophisticated sport, strike somebody with an elbow, self-trained, I need to win something in space too, it is easier for a person without disabilities to go to space, than for a disabled person to take the stairs and leave their apartment, drag oneself out of the apartment, actually, it’s easy to live without a leg, etc.

Sentences are mainly simple and short. The protagonist’s speech seems to prove that there is no place for sentiments in his life, only for well-coordinated actions. A reader gets to know the story of the Paralympian, visual materials give them a vivid understanding of the challenges he has faced, but in the end, he has not given up on himself and won the European Championship. Such multimedia stories enable users to scroll the content of a window. The next visual part, together with a verbal component, contains a photo that shows a prosthetic leg and a red racket next to it. The photo is accompanied by the following text: “When I was still in the hospital after the amputation, I asked them to bring me a racket. My family did not do it. However, in less than three weeks after the amputation, I was holding a racket in my hands and trained with a crutch”.

Both the text and the image work as an integral unity, since the racket is illustrated in front of the prosthetic leg of Viktor Didukh, which means it is impossible to live without sport despite the loss of a leg. By analogy with the first case, this text also features complete creolization: the components are interdependent. The next image shows how difficult tennis is: it features the player bending and leaning on his racket. He says that one should always be focused: “The grandstands in Rio were so noisy that I was not able to hear the sound of the ball hitting the table. Hearing plays an important role in our profession because it helps to see where the ball rebounds (…). So, it was like hearing missiles being fired nearby, and you have to play tennis there” (Mazur et al., n.d.).

In one of the photos, Viktor Didukh was shown with a determined look on his face. This refers to the activity of his table tennis academy, where everyone has an opportunity to train: starting from children and retirees to masters of sports. Viktor is determined to train persons with disabilities, however, “persons who use wheelchairs are not able to move freely, in big cities they are always facing obstacles, for example, even traveling by public transport can be a problem” (Mazur et al., n.d.). The sportsman expresses his claims on behalf of all persons with disabilities and points out the unrealistic conditions to do sports: “It is easier for a person without disabilities to go to space, than for a person with disabilities to take the stairs and leave his or her apartment, to have a ride by public transport, to enter the gym and start training” (Mazur et al., n.d.). Overall, the visual part prevails in the text structure of that story: the photos reflect the texts vividly, while the latter serve as small logical conclusions to the former.

An important structural and compositional peculiarity of this media text is the division of information into certain blocks: “About injury”, “About family”, “About professionalism”, “About sport”, “About table tennis”, “About satisfaction”, “About training”, “About Paralympic Games”, “About victory”, “About medal”, “About coaching”, “About The Anti-Terrorist Operation”; that makes the understanding of information easier for readers, showing different aspects of the main hero’s life, and altogether creates an image of a strong person, who has achieved, in this instance, his goal.

Today, the youth possess the most abundant resources to access the mass media. Accordingly, based on their opinions, we shall determine how the creolized media text about persons with disabilities influences the readers (in our case, students aged from 16 to 23). Taking into account the opinion of the young generation of people without disabilities, we will be able to find out, firstly, the level of attitude (respect, equality, sympathy) toward persons with disabilities in Ukraine; secondly, we will identify the peculiarities of the creolized media text impact about persons with disabilities on the readers aged from 16 to 23; thirdly, we shall learn how the text impacts the readers’ imagination and develops mental images in their mind.

Such an assessment is necessary, to adjust the actions of the social security institutions and the mass media resources to properly represent persons with disabilities in the mass media. Information about the level of influence of the creolized text may be obtained by conducting a survey among the students of the Ukrainian Institute of Arts and Sciences. It goes without saying that specialized surveys among students have always taken place in Ukraine: since 2009, the Ukrainian Ministry of Education recommended that educational institutions should systematically conduct surveys among students, including those studying journalism regarding the issue of the mass media effective development.

4 Research methods

To expand and confirm some of the provisions of the theoretical studies we have outlined above, we conducted a social survey. The survey aimed to understand how creolized texts about people with disabilities affect readers. The dates of the survey ranged from January 20–23, 2020. The audience included applicants for higher education in the specialties “journalism”; “psychology”; “physical education” of the Ukrainian Humanitarian Institute. The sample resulted in 126 respondents. The study was carried out by the Ukrainian Scientific Society named after Teofil Babienko.

The collection of information was carried out through the dissemination of standardized questionnaires created using Google Forms. The questionnaire, entitled “Creolization and the influence of media text on people with disabilities: the reader’s reaction”, was divided into three blocks: biological, socio-psychological, and mediacentric, and contained 30 questions, some of which contained test answers (10 questions with three options) and 20 questions with written answers. The basis and example for processing the results of the questioning of students was the article by Fomina and Zhiganova (2017): “Methodology of survey results processing with the use of multivariate and parametric statistics”.

The proposed method for processing the results of the survey includes two stages. At the first stage, the method of factor analysis is applied to the results of the questionnaire, which makes it possible to single out the aggregate variables that affect the answers of the respondents. In the example under consideration, a table with data that includes answers to questions 1–10 was used as the initial data for factor analysis. At the second stage of the study, the analysis of the relationship of the identified factors with additional socio-demographic variables is carried out, which allows you to get an idea of which values of the factor variables are most pronounced in a particular group of students, and to test the hypothesis about the independence of features.

Automated processing of the obtained data was carried out in the statistica package. To identify the main factors that determine the attitude of students towards people with special needs, factor analysis was applied using the maximum likelihood method. The purpose of the first step of the method was to solve the question of the optimal number of factors. As a result, two factors (two eigenvalues greater than one) were identified that affect the results of the questionnaire.

As you can see from Graph 1, the percentage of variance explained by the first general factor was 27.30, and by the second, 18.74. The total percentage of variance explained by all factors is 47.31. Thus, the first factor can be characterized as “Influences”. In general, the explanatory “strength” of the factor, or factorial weight, is 27.30%. From a substantive point of view, the results obtained do not contradict common sense, i.e. the degree of influence is correlated. The second factor is closely related to questions 11–30, in which the respondents indicated their attitude towards photographs. The factor can be conventionally designated as “Impression”. Its factorial weight was 18.74%. The analysis of the results of the questionnaire shows that in the whole sample the second value (“I consider the Paralympians as heroes”) of the factor variable f1 (54% of the respondents) is most pronounced. The chi-square test indicates a slight difference in the attitude of respondents to people with special needs (p = 0.56> α = 0.05).

Graph 01
Biological block (level of influence of physical component of persons with disabilities on those around them)

In the first part of the questionnaire, we inserted an article with photographs about Viktor Didukh. All respondents were warned to read the text of the article before answering the questionnaire. The collection of primary data took place in an automated mode, while the responses received were simultaneously compiled. However, the questions that required a written answer were collected in a separate bank of answers. The purpose of this division was to establish the level of influence that the creolized media text about the Olympic achievements of the Paralympian Viktor Didukh exerted on the readers (students).

The results were announced at a round table during a regular meeting of members of the Ukrainian Scientific Society named after Teofil Babienko (February 1, 2020, Lviv city), during a meeting of members of the charitable organization “Bucha Community Fund” (February 5, 2020, Bucha city) and meeting of the student scientific society of the philological faculty of V.N.Karazin Kharkiv National University (February 13, 2020, the city of Kharkiv).

5 Research results

The analysis of personal data, based on the results of the study, was presented under the block structure of the questionnaire. This approach was chosen to reliably determine which components of the creolized text about the Paralympian Viktor Didykh (text, photo) most affected the reader. The first block was biological, which suggested that, after viewing the photos from the article about the Paralympic athlete, students would choose the answers closest to their thoughts and emotions. Students’ answers to the questions in the questionnaire are set out below.

• Biological block (For instance, do you believe that Paralympians are equal to Olympic athletes? Do you regard persons with disabilities to be equal to you in status and skills? Do you feel sympathetic toward persons with disabilities?)

With the help of the conducted survey, we found that respondents of both categories (aged 16–19 – 60%, aged 20–23 – 80%) believe that Paralympians are equal to Olympic athletes and are not inferior to them; however, they showed a rather neutral and passive attitude toward the situation of sharing a classroom with persons with disabilities (age 16–19 years old – 0%, age 20–23 years old – 20%). According to the survey, younger respondents feel disgusted toward persons with a disability, while elder ones do not feel disgusted (age 16–19 years old – 40%, age 20–23 years old – 0%). It is a well-known fact that persons with disabilities want to be treated as equals; nevertheless, the respondents aged from 20–23 treat them with pity and sympathy (100%); on the contrary, the respondents aged from 16–20 show less sympathy (20%); that can be explained by peculiarities of their age: they have not realized yet how complicated life is. In general, the majority of the respondents believe that persons with disabilities are equal to them in status and skills (aged 16–19 – 40%, aged 20–23 – 80%). Therefore, it may be concluded that younger respondents are more distant from the problems of persons with disabilities, perceive them with a certain disgust, while elder respondents treat persons with disabilities with tolerance.

• Psychological and social block (For example, how do articles about the achievements and victories of persons with disabilities in Ukraine make you feel? Do you enjoy communicating with persons with disabilities of your age? Do you agree that both persons with disabilities and persons without disabilities are equal participants in social life and that achievements of persons with disabilities as well as their social activity should receive wide media coverage too?)

Graph 2
Socio-psychological block (level of influence of social interaction between persons with disabilities and those around them)

Examining this block, we learned that: respondents of both categories understand that persons with disabilities have every right to be productive members of society, they feel very proud of their compatriots, however, they are not ready for interaction and have not decided yet, whether they enjoy communicating with these people (aged 16–19 – 0 %, aged 20–23 – 0 %). Similarly, persons without disabilities are not ready to work with persons with disabilities, they have not decided yet, whether they like persons with disabilities (aged 16–19 – 18 %, aged 20–23 – 22 %). In this regard, we see that people think and remember about persons with disabilities when the latter prove themselves, show certain achievements, but at the same time, persons without disabilities and persons with disabilities are separated by a “gap”, which we gradually try to overcome. This can be facilitated by the creolized media texts and wide media coverage that will change the attitude of society.

• Media block (For example, how do the creolized texts about persons with disabilities influence your feelings and imagination? Do you feel proud of persons with disabilities, who receive national and worldwide acknowledgment for their activity? What feelings and images does the article “Paralympians. Viktor Didukh” trigger in your mind?)

Graph 3
Mediacentric block (the level of influence of the media texts about persons with disabilities on the readers)

The mediacentric block research showed a positive tendency in attitudes toward persons with disabilities through the journalistic text that combines images and text. Therefore, the respondents aged from 20 to 23 noticed that the information about persons with disabilities had a positive impact on their thoughts: the creolized texts contribute to the formation of positive images of persons with disabilities in their mind so that they have a wish to get acquainted and communicate with a person who has achieved remarkable success in a certain sphere (98–100%); this is particularly true for Viktor Didukh, who is a table tennis champion, and there are very few people like him in Ukraine.

The respondents aged from 16 to 20 tend to be less excited; however, they also note a positive influence of the creolized texts on their thoughts and imagination (80–100%); they were extremely influenced by the media text about Viktor Didukh. As a result, the mass media have proved to have a tremendous influence on the development of public opinion, especially when it comes to the youth. Therefore, the mass media are to have a leading position in the development of the positive image of persons with disabilities using all means to attract the readers’ attention. These should be stories not only about famous people but also about ordinary, average persons who shall inspire others to communicate with them and understand their nondifference.

Naturally, not every media text can be creolized; as a rule, creolized is the text that combines images and text (printed version), for example, videotext – video sequence + verbal text. The way a word has been read may have a great impact on the development of images in a person’s imagination. In this case, we may suggest the notion of the “imagined creolization”. In our opinion, this notion has the right to exist because the respondents who took part in the survey were able to recreate the image of the person with disabilities in their imagination after they read only the verbal part. As a matter of fact, 91% of the respondents claim that the media text about the protagonist, of the article under consideration, activated their attention; 87% of the respondents admitted the influence of this text on their feelings; 95% developed a positive attitude toward Viktor Didukh owing to the text message, 86% of the respondents imagined his personality.

Graph 4
Level of creolization of the media text, %

Therefore, it was determined that combining images and text into a semantic unity has a great impact on the development of youth’s thoughts and helps attract their attention. The analyzed article emphasizes the achievements of the main hero that has a positive coloring and promotes the integration of persons with disabilities into society. It was found out that there are very few scientific studies dedicated to studying the influence that the creolized media texts about persons with disabilities exert on readers to the full extent.

It was revealed that the combination of verbal and nonverbal components simplifies access to understanding the article, influences readers’ moods and emotions, evoking certain reactions to the information they see. In the multimedia story about Viktor Didukh, the visual component prevails: it encodes information that may be interpreted only through the text located on the images. These are mainly texts with complete creolization, where relations of mutual complementation dominate so that an image cannot exist without a text. Compositionally, the story is divided into blocks that structure information and promote its systemization and understanding, namely: “About injury”, “About family”, “About professionalism”, “About sport”, “About table tennis”, “About satisfaction”, “About training”, “About Paralympic Games”, “About victory”, “About medal”, “About coaching”, “About The Anti-Terrorist Operation”.

6 Conclusions

The survey allowed us to find out the attitude of college-aged persons toward persons with disabilities, and how the creolized media texts influence their attitudes toward this category of people. The research of the media text creolization influence is divided into blocks: biological, socio-psychological, and mediacentric.

The results of the biological block research showed that the respondents do not deny that Paralympians are equal to Olympic athletes, and to themselves in status and skills, but at the same time, they are not ready to share a classroom with persons with disabilities. Elder respondents (20–23 years) treat persons with disabilities with more sympathy and less disgust, while younger (16–19 years) ones show less sympathy and more disgust, which may be explained by peculiarities of their age.

The socio-psychological block research shows the readiness of the youth to communicate with persons with disabilities, to perceive them as equal participants of social life. Unfortunately, the research proved that society remembers about persons with disabilities when they have certain achievements that are not easy even for persons without disabilities; but, at the same time, there is a “gap” when it comes to communication. This gap should get smaller under the influence of the mass media, as shown by the study of the next block.

Within the media block, it was found out that the creolized media texts influence thoughts, with a tendency to a positive attitude toward persons with disabilities, because almost all questions included in the questionnaire within this block received 80–100% of support from the respondents (for instance, the desire to get acquainted with hero Paralympians of their country, the development of their positive image, etc.). Within this context, the notion of the “imaginary creolization” has the right to exist, because when reading the text about Viktor Didukh, most of the respondents were able to imagine his personality, and describe his characteristic features, as well as his approach to life. Therefore, the main task of society and the mass media lies in promoting the social integration of persons with disabilities and a more tolerant attitude toward them.

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Edited by

Desk Review Editor: Tania Rosas-Moreno

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  15 Apr 2022
• Date of issue
  Jan-Apr 2021

History

• Received
  09 Apr 2020
• Reviewed
  11 June 2020
• Reviewed
  06 July 2020
• Reviewed
  05 Oct 2020
• Accepted
  01 Dec 2020