Popular Culture Review 30.1
es , discussing taboo topics such as sexuality and prostitution within a moralizing framework ( Stamp 44 ). Nevertheless , such fears did not subside and finally culminated in the Payne Fund Studies , “ a series of sociological and psychological inquiries into the effects of motion pictures on youth ” ( Vasey 127 ) conducted in the late 1920s and early 1930s . First published in 1933 , these studies mark the first serious attempt to analyze media influence . Following the Payne studies , there have been continuous inquiries into how violence in media such as film , television , and videogames can influence viewers to exhibit more aggressive , violent behaviors because they are idealized in entertainment ( Signorelli 18 ). Contrastingly , much less attention had been paid to the possible influence popular media can exert toward suicidal behavior . Scientific studies regarding this particular subject were not conducted until the 1960s ( Blood and Perkis 155 ). However , with the 2017 release of the web television series 13 Reasons Why , this topic was launched into the forefront of public debate .
13 Reasons Why , adapted by Brian Yorkey from the 2007 novel Thirteen Reasons Why , premiered on streaming service Netflix on March 31 , 2017 , immediately accruing commercial success . As with its source material , the plot of 13 Reasons Why concerns the aftermath and fallout of a high school girl ’ s suicide . The student , Hannah Baker , dies from overdosing on pills in the novel ; in the television adaptation , she cuts her wrists in her bathtub , the act of which is portrayed on-screen in a flashback during the first season finale , “ Tape 7 , Side A .” In both versions , her classmate and friend Clay Jensen subsequently receives a package containing 13 tapes Hannah recorded before her suicide . Each tape identifies a specific person that Hannah , a victim of bullying and sexual assault , blames for her suicide . Clay , who had secretly been in love
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