Active audience reception Flashcards
What does active audience models mean?…
Active audience models assume the audience are not entirely passive (not thinking) they instead suggest The media as far less influential and believe that people have considerable choice in the way they use and interpret the media.
2-step-flow model (Katz and Lazarsfeld 1956)…
The first of the active approaches we will be looking at is the 2 step flow model. This one is all about real social relationships.
Katz and Lazarsfeld (1965) suggest that personal relationships and conversations with significant others, such as family members, friends, teachers and work colleagues, result in people modifying or rejecting media messages we see this increasingly in social media and networks.
Who are opinion leaders?…
People of influence whom others in the network look up to and listen to. These people usually have strong ideas about a range of matters. Moreover, these opinion leaders expose themselves to different types of media and form an opinion on their content.
These interpretations are then passed on to other members of their social circle. Katz and Lazarsfeld suggest that media messages have to go through two steps or stages.
Two steps…
1) The opinion leader is exposed to the media content.
2) Those who respect the opinion leader internalise their interpretation of that content.
Consequently, media audiences are not directly influenced by the media. Rather, they choose to adopt a particular opinion, attitude and way of behaving after negotiation and discussion with an opinion leader. The audience is, therefore, not passive, but active.
Critiques…
There is no guarantee that the opinion leader has not been subjected to an imitative or desensitising effect.
e.g. a leader of a peer group, such as a street gang, might convince other members that violence is acceptable because he has been exposed to computer games that strongly transmit the message that violence is an acceptable problem-solving strategy.
People who may be most at risk of being influenced by the media may be socially isolated individuals who are not members of any social network and so do not have access to an opinion leader who might help interpret media content in a healthy way.
Selective filter model (Klapper 1960)…
In his selective filter model, Klapper (1960) suggests that, for a media message to have any effect, it has to pass through three filters of active selection.
Selective exposure – the audience must choose to view, read or listen to the content of specific media. Media messages can have no effect if no one sees or hears them. However, what the audience chooses depends upon their interests, education, work commitments and so on.
Selective perception – the audience may not accept the message; some people may take notice of some media content, but decide to reject or ignore others.
Selective retention – the messages have to ‘stick’ in the mind of those who have accessed the media content. However, research indicates that most people have a tendency to remember only the things they broadly agree with.
The uses and gratification model…
Spoken about by - Blumler and McQuail (1968), Lull (1995) and (Wood 1993).
They argue – the audience is way more active than even the previous models suggest they say the audience actually uses the media to gratify a need.
Wood (1993) illustrated how teenagers may use horror films to gratify their need for excitement. Blumler and McQuail identify four basic needs which people use the media to satisfy.
1) Diversion…
People may immerse themselves in particular types of media to make up for the lack of satisfaction at work or in their daily lives, e.g. women may compensate for the lack of romance in their marriages by reading romantic novels.
Some people even have alternative lives and identities as avatars on websites such as Second Life and lesser so games such as the Sims.
2) Personal relationships…
Media products such as soap operas may compensate for the decline of community in our lives.
e.g. socially isolated elderly people may see soap opera characters as companions they can identify with and worry about in the absence of interaction with family members.
Cyber-communities on the Internet may also be seen by users as alternative families.
3) Personal identity…
People may use the media to ‘make over’ or to modify their identity.
Social networking websites, such as instagram, allow people to use the media to present their particular identities to the wider world in a way that they can control.
4) Surveillance…
People use the media to obtain information and news in order to help them make up their minds on particular issues.
The reception analysis model…
Morley’s (1980) research into how audiences interpreted the content of a well-known 1970s evening news programme called Nationwide examined how the ideological content of the programme (i.e. the messages that were contained in the text and images) were interpreted by 29 groups made up of people from a range of educational and professional backgrounds.
Morley found that audiences were very active in their reading of media content and did not automatically accept the media’s perspective on a range of issues. Morley concluded that people choose to read or interpret media content in three ways.
Preferred, oppositional and negotiated…
The preferred (or dominant) reading accepts the media content as legitimate, e.g. the British people generally approve of the Royal Family, so very few people are likely to interpret stories about them in a critical fashion. This dominant reading is often shared by journalists and editors, and underpins news values.
The oppositional reading opposes the views expressed in media content.
The negotiated reading whereby the audience reinterpret the media content to fit in with their own opinions and values, e.g. they may not have any strong views on the Royal Family, but enjoy reading about celebrity lives.
The audience are not homogeneous and messages are polysemic…
Morley argues that the average person belongs to several sub-cultural groups and this may complicate a person’s reading of media content in the sense that they may not be consistent in their interpretation of it.
Reception analysis theory therefore suggests that audiences are not passive, impressionable and homogeneous.
They act in a variety of subcultural ways and, for this reason, media content is polysemic, i.e. it attracts more than one type of reading or interpretation.
The postmodernist model…
Strinati (1995) argues that the media today are the most influential shapers of identity and offer a greater range of consumption choices in terms of identities and lifestyles.
More so, in the post-modern world, the media transmits the idea that the consumption of signs and symbols for their own sake is more important than the goods they represent.
In other words, the media encourages the consumption of logos, designer labels and brands, and these become more important to people’s sense of identity than the physical clothes and goods themselves.
