THE ROLE OF THE MASS MEDIA IN DEFINING YOUTH SAFETY CULTURE

The need for security is one of the basic human needs, and it occupies one of the basic places in the hierarchy of human motivation. Since prehistoric times, the human community and individuals, first in harmony with nature, and then with social challenges, have developed solutions and responses to challenges and threats to their survival, existence and development. As human society has progressed in its development, new challenges and threats to both individual and collective security have progressively emerged. In today's age and in modern society, there has been a paradoxical situation, that we have an exponentially increased number of security risks, and that the security culture, or the culture of security of life, has practically disappeared from the culture. The reasons are complex, and there are many factors in that chain. One of the most important factors is the media, especially the mass media, which in most aspects determine social consciousness, especially among adolescents and young people. The aim of this paper is to investigate the correlation between media, public discourse and adolescent culture, mechanisms of media action, as well as ways in which these mechanisms can be directed towards better performance of socially useful functions, of which encouraging the development of security culture awareness is one of the key tasks for the common good.