Lecture 1
A successful campaign reaches a specific audience and has measurable goals.
The choice of the media used depends on the audience.
● Which media are used
● Different channels have different characteristics
● The channels are the media.
Informational, emotional
● Not vague and specific
Reciprocity principle with the audience, we want to elicit a certain effect.
● Available audience
● Attentive audience
● Cumulative audience (snowball)
Working principles for campaigns:
Theories → Models → Concepts
The Golden Gate Park
19th century template for campaigns. The starting point for the modern age campaign.
Printing process was revolutionised. Print became cheaper to produce.
Designed by Randolph Hearst → multichannel campaigns.
*Different channels for different sectors of the population.
*By analysing the audience, he diversified the channels and allowed the high reach of the
campaign.
Greek Rhetorica
> persuasion theories
> first models and theories about communication campaigns.
19th century
> industrialization
> rise of nationalism
> birth of political parties
> birth of socialism
> emancipation of the masses
and the popular press started to rise.
20th century & World War I
> newspapers
> magazines
> radio
First real competition for 19th century print media.
Nationalism was so intense in this era, propaganda and print’s big role in what the media is
right now.
MASS COMMUNICATION → attention → importance
,Lecture 2
Agenda Setting → media tell us what to think about.
The public agenda is influenced by the media agenda.
The media gives us an overview of who is important and what is important.
The main news of the day which influences the public.
→ the effects are peripheral and short tem
Media agenda influences:
1. Public agenda
2. Policy agenda
Two-step flow
Peripheral effects, theory that involves opinion leaders.
Persuasion through opinion leaders. Influencing their own social group.
Who are they?
Media savvy: critical and sceptical
Relatively easy to approach: contact
Open to logical argumentation: difficult to influence, convincing through the central route.
…persuading the public through opinion leaders.
Two different stages
1. Reaching and influencing the opinion leader. Difficult part.
2. Then reaching the public
Marshall McLuhan → The Toronto School
*how different channels embed themselves in the messages they spread.
*the medium is the message
Second level agenda setting
Framing
Different themes, angles and perspectives used to discuss something.
Salience and giving meaning to topics.
A lot of perspectives, different stories, different outcomes, different solutions.
Conscious or subconscious effect.
Priming
Deep framing
● Issues that receive the most attention in the media are important factors.
● Preparing the brain for stimuli
● Semantic, perceptual or conceptual stimulus repetition …
Subconscious effect.
Bringing up something from the past to remind and activate a memory, can be good and bad.
, Inoculation Theory → Activate people’s filters.
Using campaigns to block persuasion attempts.
Blockades due to:
1. Threat of persuasion
People don't really like to be persuaded
2. Refutational preemption
Answer to the argument of your opponent
Counterarguing.
Used in: healthcare campaigns, war and propaganda, crisis communication.
Methods of research
1. Observation
2. Experiment
3. Survey
4. Interview
5. Focus groups
6. Content analysis
Van Ruler trends → hindrance to communication research!
● Decline of trust: attacking the sources in media landscape
● The digital world
● The communicative organisation → sending out but listening to the audience.
Cultural approach to communication
*cultural theories, a response to monosemic models.
*polysemic models! Messages having different meanings, it depends on the audience.
Ritual model
*communication as a symbolic process whereby reality is produced, maintained, repaired
and transformed.
*alternative to the transmission perspective
Why did this change happen?
● Culture is a shared experience, communication connects us.
● Constant change
● Following fixed patterns
● Communication and culture through time and space.
Encoding - Decoding
Stuart Hall and the Birmingham School introduced the cultural approach.
Encoded by sender
Decoded by receiver
Encoding and decoding messages imply using a given culture while doing it.
A successful campaign reaches a specific audience and has measurable goals.
The choice of the media used depends on the audience.
● Which media are used
● Different channels have different characteristics
● The channels are the media.
Informational, emotional
● Not vague and specific
Reciprocity principle with the audience, we want to elicit a certain effect.
● Available audience
● Attentive audience
● Cumulative audience (snowball)
Working principles for campaigns:
Theories → Models → Concepts
The Golden Gate Park
19th century template for campaigns. The starting point for the modern age campaign.
Printing process was revolutionised. Print became cheaper to produce.
Designed by Randolph Hearst → multichannel campaigns.
*Different channels for different sectors of the population.
*By analysing the audience, he diversified the channels and allowed the high reach of the
campaign.
Greek Rhetorica
> persuasion theories
> first models and theories about communication campaigns.
19th century
> industrialization
> rise of nationalism
> birth of political parties
> birth of socialism
> emancipation of the masses
and the popular press started to rise.
20th century & World War I
> newspapers
> magazines
> radio
First real competition for 19th century print media.
Nationalism was so intense in this era, propaganda and print’s big role in what the media is
right now.
MASS COMMUNICATION → attention → importance
,Lecture 2
Agenda Setting → media tell us what to think about.
The public agenda is influenced by the media agenda.
The media gives us an overview of who is important and what is important.
The main news of the day which influences the public.
→ the effects are peripheral and short tem
Media agenda influences:
1. Public agenda
2. Policy agenda
Two-step flow
Peripheral effects, theory that involves opinion leaders.
Persuasion through opinion leaders. Influencing their own social group.
Who are they?
Media savvy: critical and sceptical
Relatively easy to approach: contact
Open to logical argumentation: difficult to influence, convincing through the central route.
…persuading the public through opinion leaders.
Two different stages
1. Reaching and influencing the opinion leader. Difficult part.
2. Then reaching the public
Marshall McLuhan → The Toronto School
*how different channels embed themselves in the messages they spread.
*the medium is the message
Second level agenda setting
Framing
Different themes, angles and perspectives used to discuss something.
Salience and giving meaning to topics.
A lot of perspectives, different stories, different outcomes, different solutions.
Conscious or subconscious effect.
Priming
Deep framing
● Issues that receive the most attention in the media are important factors.
● Preparing the brain for stimuli
● Semantic, perceptual or conceptual stimulus repetition …
Subconscious effect.
Bringing up something from the past to remind and activate a memory, can be good and bad.
, Inoculation Theory → Activate people’s filters.
Using campaigns to block persuasion attempts.
Blockades due to:
1. Threat of persuasion
People don't really like to be persuaded
2. Refutational preemption
Answer to the argument of your opponent
Counterarguing.
Used in: healthcare campaigns, war and propaganda, crisis communication.
Methods of research
1. Observation
2. Experiment
3. Survey
4. Interview
5. Focus groups
6. Content analysis
Van Ruler trends → hindrance to communication research!
● Decline of trust: attacking the sources in media landscape
● The digital world
● The communicative organisation → sending out but listening to the audience.
Cultural approach to communication
*cultural theories, a response to monosemic models.
*polysemic models! Messages having different meanings, it depends on the audience.
Ritual model
*communication as a symbolic process whereby reality is produced, maintained, repaired
and transformed.
*alternative to the transmission perspective
Why did this change happen?
● Culture is a shared experience, communication connects us.
● Constant change
● Following fixed patterns
● Communication and culture through time and space.
Encoding - Decoding
Stuart Hall and the Birmingham School introduced the cultural approach.
Encoded by sender
Decoded by receiver
Encoding and decoding messages imply using a given culture while doing it.
