Media Effects
COMM2112 Theories of Communication and Persuasion h i f i i d i
Paul Emerson Teusner 12 March 2008 12 March 2008
So far So far
• What is a theory of communication?
– Course coordinator’s own bias
• Process model of communication
– Sh Shannon and Weaver dW
Effects tradition Effects tradition
• Asks the question:
How do mass media affect us?
Why this question? Why this question?
Concerns of North America in 1920s & 30s • New technologies & mass audiences New technologies & mass audiences • Social consequences of migration, urbanization and industrialization b i i di d i li i • Fears about society as relatively defenceless y y and susceptible to manipulation • F it Fascist uses of media in Europe f di i E • Build up of American war effort
Orson Welles’ 1938 Halloween broadcast
Mass media are... Mass media are
• communication/messages/information i i / /i f i • emanating from an individual or g organisational source • through electronic or mechanical coding through electronic or mechanical coding giving multiplication of message • to a relatively large heterogeneous and to a relatively large heterogeneous and anonymous audience • with limited and indirect means of feedback
In a mass‐mediated society... In a mass mediated society
…we are bombarded by symbolic messages… b b d db b li …derived by others with power… …who are generally inaccessible… …in which individuality is not respected… …over which we have little control through p feedback or protest.
Different Effects theories Different Effects theories
• H Hypodermic d i • Social learning • Psychological theory • Uses and gratifications • Cultivation analysis
The “hypodermic” or “magic bullet” yp g approach
• Based on the Shannon & Weaver model Weaver model • Th b d t i j t The broadcaster injects his message unhindered into the minds of people into the minds of people
Assumptions of the hypodermic approach
• an atomised,...
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