Bauer (1964): The obstinate audience
-‐ The people most likely to attend to a message are the most difficult to
change; those who can be converted do not look or listen
-‐ All agree that man acts so as to restore equilibrium to his system of
belief
Dervin (1989): The Sense-Making Approach
-‐ The individual must choose to attend to and ascribe reality and
significance to the message, otherwise he will not engage
-‐ A connection between individual and campaign will only occur when
the campaign message is around to be attended to and/or has become
a stored understanding of the individual’s world
-‐ Information-as-construction vs. information-as-description
o IAC (dialogue model): information has truth value, a known
testable descriptive relationship with reality, and can be
separated from observer(s)
o IAD (transmission model): information is created by human
observers, inherently a product of human self-interest, can never
be separated from the observers who created it (hypodermic
needle theory)
-‐ Qualities of sense-making approach:
o Ethnographic (respondents define and anchor their own
realities)
o Qualitative: Built on open-ended interviewing
o Quantitative: Procedures for quant. analysis have been
developed
o Systematic: General theory guides the approach to listening
-‐ Sense-making is primarily methodology providing conceptual
framework
-‐ Gaps are always cognitive, sometimes physical as well
Gerbner (1956): Toward a General Model of Communication
-‐ Areas of study:
, o Someone -> Communicator and audience research
o Perceives an event -> Perception research and theory
o And reacts -> Effectiveness measurement
o In a situation -> Study of physical, social setting
o Through some means -> Investigation of channels, media,
controls over facilities
o To make available materials -> Administration; distribution;
freedom of access to materials
o In some form -> Structure, organization, style, pattern
o And context -> Study of communicative setting, sequence
o Conveying content -> Content analysis, study of meaning
o Of some consequence -> Study of over-all changes
Grunig (1989a): Publics, audiences, and market segments
-‐ Mass audiences are large, heterogeneous, disconnected, and
anonymous to the communicator
-‐ Segments must be definable, mutually exclusive, reachable with
communications in an affordable way, large enough to be substantial
and to service economically
-‐ Campaigns may strive for effects on cognitions and attitudes, not only
for behavioral change
-‐ Behavior of segments can be better understood by using inferred
variables (measured by direct questioning) rather than objective ones
(measured from secondary sources)
-‐ Problem recognition:
o A person notices a need to be fulfilled
o Results from internal and external stimuli
o Problems, unlike needs, can be identified and measured
o Issue = political or social problem (resolution creates conflict in
political or social systems)
-‐ Constraint recognition:
o Individual volition (absence of constraints) is a necessary
condition for cognitive dissonance
, o People notice they can do little/nothing about a problem or
behavior
-‐ Involvement recognition:
o “The degree of importance or concern” that a product/behavior
generates in an individual
o Separate populations into active and passive segments
-‐ Publics vs. markets
o Organizations have little choice in communicating with (active)
publics, whereas they can choose to ignore markets
-‐ Communities
o Overlap between publics and lifestyles
o Pluralistic communities: more than one public
§ The more pluralistic a community, the more diverse its’
publics
Mendelsohn (1973): Some reasons why information campaigns
can succeed
-‐ Evaluations of campaigns have focused on inabilities rather than
capabilities
-‐ Communication practitioners eye evaluations of their efforts with
suspicion and distrust
-‐ Important to uncover not only the scope of indifference, but its’ roots as
well
-‐ Campaign objectives must be spelled out explicitly, specifically, and
realistically
-‐ The public isn’t indifferent to subjects, it’s just a matter of how the
subjects are being presented/addressed
-‐ “Canzion de la Raza”, “A Snort Story”, “The National Drivers Test”
-‐ Social science research can help determining appropriate targets,
themes, appeals, and media vehicles to bring message across properly
Nillesen (1995): On the scientific frame of “voorlichting”
-‐ The people most likely to attend to a message are the most difficult to
change; those who can be converted do not look or listen
-‐ All agree that man acts so as to restore equilibrium to his system of
belief
Dervin (1989): The Sense-Making Approach
-‐ The individual must choose to attend to and ascribe reality and
significance to the message, otherwise he will not engage
-‐ A connection between individual and campaign will only occur when
the campaign message is around to be attended to and/or has become
a stored understanding of the individual’s world
-‐ Information-as-construction vs. information-as-description
o IAC (dialogue model): information has truth value, a known
testable descriptive relationship with reality, and can be
separated from observer(s)
o IAD (transmission model): information is created by human
observers, inherently a product of human self-interest, can never
be separated from the observers who created it (hypodermic
needle theory)
-‐ Qualities of sense-making approach:
o Ethnographic (respondents define and anchor their own
realities)
o Qualitative: Built on open-ended interviewing
o Quantitative: Procedures for quant. analysis have been
developed
o Systematic: General theory guides the approach to listening
-‐ Sense-making is primarily methodology providing conceptual
framework
-‐ Gaps are always cognitive, sometimes physical as well
Gerbner (1956): Toward a General Model of Communication
-‐ Areas of study:
, o Someone -> Communicator and audience research
o Perceives an event -> Perception research and theory
o And reacts -> Effectiveness measurement
o In a situation -> Study of physical, social setting
o Through some means -> Investigation of channels, media,
controls over facilities
o To make available materials -> Administration; distribution;
freedom of access to materials
o In some form -> Structure, organization, style, pattern
o And context -> Study of communicative setting, sequence
o Conveying content -> Content analysis, study of meaning
o Of some consequence -> Study of over-all changes
Grunig (1989a): Publics, audiences, and market segments
-‐ Mass audiences are large, heterogeneous, disconnected, and
anonymous to the communicator
-‐ Segments must be definable, mutually exclusive, reachable with
communications in an affordable way, large enough to be substantial
and to service economically
-‐ Campaigns may strive for effects on cognitions and attitudes, not only
for behavioral change
-‐ Behavior of segments can be better understood by using inferred
variables (measured by direct questioning) rather than objective ones
(measured from secondary sources)
-‐ Problem recognition:
o A person notices a need to be fulfilled
o Results from internal and external stimuli
o Problems, unlike needs, can be identified and measured
o Issue = political or social problem (resolution creates conflict in
political or social systems)
-‐ Constraint recognition:
o Individual volition (absence of constraints) is a necessary
condition for cognitive dissonance
, o People notice they can do little/nothing about a problem or
behavior
-‐ Involvement recognition:
o “The degree of importance or concern” that a product/behavior
generates in an individual
o Separate populations into active and passive segments
-‐ Publics vs. markets
o Organizations have little choice in communicating with (active)
publics, whereas they can choose to ignore markets
-‐ Communities
o Overlap between publics and lifestyles
o Pluralistic communities: more than one public
§ The more pluralistic a community, the more diverse its’
publics
Mendelsohn (1973): Some reasons why information campaigns
can succeed
-‐ Evaluations of campaigns have focused on inabilities rather than
capabilities
-‐ Communication practitioners eye evaluations of their efforts with
suspicion and distrust
-‐ Important to uncover not only the scope of indifference, but its’ roots as
well
-‐ Campaign objectives must be spelled out explicitly, specifically, and
realistically
-‐ The public isn’t indifferent to subjects, it’s just a matter of how the
subjects are being presented/addressed
-‐ “Canzion de la Raza”, “A Snort Story”, “The National Drivers Test”
-‐ Social science research can help determining appropriate targets,
themes, appeals, and media vehicles to bring message across properly
Nillesen (1995): On the scientific frame of “voorlichting”
