Media narrations are used by teenage audiences when looking for references for their identity building. As a possible starting point for Media Literacy activities to help teenage in this process, this research focuses on the representations of values proposed by italian adolescents favourite tv programmes. Eight television narrations have been chosen in order to analyse different genres, codes and values: two teen-drama ("Gossip Girl" and "I Liceali"), three reality ("Il Grande Fratello", "Amici di Maria De Filippi", "Uomini e donne"), a sit-com ("The Simpson") and two family-drama ("Un Medico in Famiglia" and "I Cesaroni"). The theoretical framework used for conceptualizing and assessing such values was Schwartz’s Model of Universal Human Values. The results shows that the representation of values proposed by tv programmes anaylized is widely influenced by genres. Also tv programmes are labeled as educational or no-educational in relation to values represented (negative or prosocial values).
Keywords: Adolescents; Values; Television; Media Education; Schwartz’s Model of Universal Human Values