Purchase Solution

Social Scientific Research Question: Two and a Half Men

Not what you're looking for?

Ask Custom Question

Question 1. Develop a social scientific research question regarding mass media representations of families. Your research question should also incorporate issues of gender and/or class as it pertains to your topic. Your research question will also indicate which television show you will focus on: "Two and a Half Men."
Question 2. You will need to do a mini literature review of 4 academic journal articles (Canadian preferably) that discuss the issues related to your scientific research question.
Question 3. After reading your articles provide a BRIEF summation of each of the them. The four summaries should very briefly address what each article is generally about, what the author argues, and what author concludes.
Question 4. How can each of these articles help answer your research question? Use specific quotes from each of the articles to support your answer.

Purchase this Solution
Solution Summary

The solution provides information, assistance and advise in tackling the task of analyzing the TV show 'Two and a half men' in terms of studying how mass media represents families. Questions in the original problem (see above) are explored and discussed). Resources are listed for further exploration of the topic.

Solution Preview

TV Show Family Dysfunction Review

Title: Two & a Half Men
Genre: Sitcom
Creators: Chuck Lorre and Lee Aronsohn
Year: Began in 2003, still ongoing
Stars: Charlie Sheen (up to season 8), John Cryer, Angus T. Jones and Ashton Kutcher (from season 9)
Company/Network: Tanenbaum Co. & Warner Bros. TV/ CBS

The show's plot is straightforward enough - Charlie Harper, a hedonistic freewheeling, non-committal and successful jingle writer who has, to his mind, an ideal life in Malibu, CA., had no choice but to open his home to his divorced brother Alan and his son Jake, whom Alan got custody of after his divorce. As 2 men living with a boy, with 2 very different views and responsibilities in life, chaos and hilarity ensue. The show enjoyed exceptionally high ratings and established Sheen, who plays Charlie Harper, as a key commercial success. But his issues with drugs in 2011 lead to a halt in the production of the hit TV show with Sheen getting fired and subsequently replaced by a Ashton Kutcher whose character, Walden Schmidt moves in with Alan & Jake, the father and son unit. Walden is trying to move on after his divorce while Alan and Jake are trying to move on with their lives after the 'death' of Charlie. Their once more hilarious chaos ensues and they become a dysfunctional but recognizable family unit.

Research Question

Quite apart from the troubles of the show and the obvious plot, what is directly touched on here is the unconventional family setting Charlie, Alan and Jake (and now Walden) have. They are not your typical family. Alan is a divorcee with a son; Charlie is an uncle who is addicted to women, sex and irresponsibility while Alan is an uptight and conservative guy. Walden is much the same with Charlie in many of his views and approach so quite easily; he replaces the 'killed off' character. In their home there is no sense of long-term continuity in the women presence in the household. The only constant are 3 - dysfunctional and neurotic Rose, Charlie's stalker/neighbour who becomes his obsession much later, Berta, Charlie's sharp-tounged housekeeper and Evelyn, their wealthy and conceited mother. I would like to focus on how such a setting affects the development of children. My research questions then are thus - "In cases where fathers get custody in a divorce, can the dysfunctional setting without the presence of a mother affect the child's development? In what ways?"

Literature

There are 4 studies that I ...

Solution provided by:
Xenia Rochelle Jones, MA, PhD (IP)
Education
  • MPhil/PhD (IP), Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
  • MA, Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
  • Certificate, Geva Ulpan (via Universita Tel Aviv)
  • BA, University of the Philippines
Recent Feedback
  • "Thank you!:)"
  • "Excellent, thank you!:)"
  • "Thank you for your timely help. I have submitted another posting (656038) and assigned it directly to you. Please help."
  • "Thank you so much for your timely help. Much appreciated."
  • "Thanks so much for your support."
Purchase this Solution
Free BrainMass Quizzes
Which play is it?

This quiz will give you one of the main ideas of a play. You have to guess which play is being talked about.

Introduction to Theatre

This quiz will examine the basic knowledge students have of theatre, including terms, history, and purpose.

Public Speaking Quiz

Quiz your understanding of public speaking. Learn about the elements of a solid speech.

View More Free Quizzes
Related BrainMass Solutions

  • Qualitative or Quantitative Approaches to Research

    Explain why you would choose a qualitative approach for this question. What do you think of when you think of research? What does it mean to be a scholar-practitioner? What is social change? How is research related to these two concepts?

  • A Traditional View of Mind and Identity

    Is there a traditional or normal idea of what my mind (my identity) is? Hello Student, The question seems to sit on the social-scientific-philosophical fence being that you are using Delanty and Strydom.

  • Doing Research - methods, problems, questions, design, etc.

    Example: • Research Design - ontology, epistemology, a review of methodology and methods applicable. • Research Problem - Body image and Social Media • Research Question - "Does the social media affect the way teens define beauty?"

  • Quantitative Data & 3 types of non-experimental method

    Sincerely, OTA 105878/Xenia Jones ------------------------------------------- The Quantitative Method In the sciences, the qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods (a combination of the two) are used as a means of doing scientific research

  • Article Review: "Women, men, and all the other categories: Psychologies for theorizing human diversity"

    It is a huge problem for developing "scientific" models. Even the term "scientific" seems to imply a simple, static, cause-and-effect element of life that might not be accurate to how we live and think. It might distort how we view the world.

  • Policy Rules and Incorporating Scientific Input

    After this has been done policymakers should conduct thorough research on scientific analysis and research that has been done on the policy issue that is in question, and to select three of the scientific inquiries for more detailed study and analysis

  • Gender and depression

    Studies have shown that the prevalence of depression among women is between one and a half and three times more than the prevalence among men.

  • The Nature of Prejudice

    Add a research question of each article answer and explain the prejudice picked, whether it is blatant or subtle, and give the reason why.

  • Discussion Question: Use of hypotheses and hypothesis testing

    A hypothesis is a concise, falsifiable statement that is subjected to observational testing as part of a scientific investigation. Scientific research generally starts with a question about the observable world.

View More Related Solutions