INTRODUCTION TO COMMUNICATIONS COMN 1000 PERSPECTIVE OF MEDIA AND
AUDIENCES
Media frame and animate our sense of identity – provide us with understanding of
ourselves
Media enlightens, seek entertain or targets to sell to advertisers or as customers who
will pay a fee
Act of communication between originator of the message and recipient became
increasingly mediated – disconnected from specific time and place
Industry research focused on finding ways to appeal those market niches – marketing
combined with tech innovation to create media outlets
Tech fragments audiences – watch on screens while multitasking – tv on computers
Audience fragmentation – serious challenge to broadcasters as it leads to a lowering of
advertising rates they can charge for any one program – to solve this, buy programs to
allow consumers to stream it across all devices, offer online components such as
backstories of the lead characters – by this, companies can track movements and
interests of consumers
To decode media content, requires audiences to have some understadngin of larger
social values
Individual cultural milieu works to create identity through acting as the reference point
– culture is a set of ideas and values which people understand and relate to a larget
organization
Effects research – effects on human behaviour and attitudes – fueled by success of
propaganda campaigns during the war, which seemed to indicate that the masses
would believe almost anything they were told – researchers built on the idea that media
can inject ideas into people’s heads – people were easily swayed by media suggestions
– after world war 2, impact of media messages on people were weak – media serves an
agenda-setting function that they work selectively to draw public attention to certain
events
Cultivation analysis – content is studied for ability to encourage particular attitudes in
viewers toward certain people or perspective
Effects analysis abstracts the process of communication from social context
Uses and gratification research – response to findings of limited effects and a reaction
to the growing concern – wide variety of new tv, radio and musical content gained
popularity in 1950s was undermining audience tastes – what do audience do with the
media? – explore their motivations in active selection of media content – puts more
AUDIENCES
Media frame and animate our sense of identity – provide us with understanding of
ourselves
Media enlightens, seek entertain or targets to sell to advertisers or as customers who
will pay a fee
Act of communication between originator of the message and recipient became
increasingly mediated – disconnected from specific time and place
Industry research focused on finding ways to appeal those market niches – marketing
combined with tech innovation to create media outlets
Tech fragments audiences – watch on screens while multitasking – tv on computers
Audience fragmentation – serious challenge to broadcasters as it leads to a lowering of
advertising rates they can charge for any one program – to solve this, buy programs to
allow consumers to stream it across all devices, offer online components such as
backstories of the lead characters – by this, companies can track movements and
interests of consumers
To decode media content, requires audiences to have some understadngin of larger
social values
Individual cultural milieu works to create identity through acting as the reference point
– culture is a set of ideas and values which people understand and relate to a larget
organization
Effects research – effects on human behaviour and attitudes – fueled by success of
propaganda campaigns during the war, which seemed to indicate that the masses
would believe almost anything they were told – researchers built on the idea that media
can inject ideas into people’s heads – people were easily swayed by media suggestions
– after world war 2, impact of media messages on people were weak – media serves an
agenda-setting function that they work selectively to draw public attention to certain
events
Cultivation analysis – content is studied for ability to encourage particular attitudes in
viewers toward certain people or perspective
Effects analysis abstracts the process of communication from social context
Uses and gratification research – response to findings of limited effects and a reaction
to the growing concern – wide variety of new tv, radio and musical content gained
popularity in 1950s was undermining audience tastes – what do audience do with the
media? – explore their motivations in active selection of media content – puts more
