Mass Media

Question 1

What are the mass media?

Answer 1

The mass media are forms of communication that reach a mass audience. They can be divided into three categories; press, broadcasting and electronic media.

Question 2

What are broadcast and electronic media?

Answer 2

Broadcasting (TV and radio) may be funded publicly or privately. The internet became available in the 1990’s and hosts the World Wide Web and email.

Question 3

What technological developments have affected the mass media over the last thirty years?

Answer 3

Important developments in mass media technology over the last thirty years include cable and satellite TV, digitalisation, interactivity, convergence and the internet.

Question 4

How widespread is newspaper readership?

Answer 4

Sociologists study how much media e consume. There has been a decline in the readership of popular newspapers in the last 25 years.

Question 5

How much television do audiences watch?

Answer 5

Ownership of digital television service has grown steadily since the 1990s. Watching television is a popular activity in leisure time.

Question 6

What use do people make of the internet?

Answer 6

Household access to the internet has grown rapidly since the late 1990s. People access the internet, for example, to send e-mails and find information about goods and services.

Question 7

What are the effects of the mass media on their audiences?

Answer 7

The impact of the mass media on audiences has been disputed. Supports of the hypodermic syringe model argue that the media could have powerful effects on people’s behaviour or beliefs. The uses and gratification approach examines what people do with the media and what needs the media satisfy.

Question 8

What are the effects of the media according to the decoding approach?

Answer 8

The decoding approach views audience members as active interpreters of media messages.

Question 9

What is the role of the mass media in the socialisation process?

Answer 9

The mass media are an important agency of socialisation and play a key part in developing people’s social identities.

Question 10

What is the mass media’s role in political socialisation?

Answer 10

The mass media, along with other agencies of socialisation, play an important part in developing people’s political beliefs and voting behaviour.

Question 11

What are the patterns of ownership within the press?

Answer 11

In the UK, newspapers are privately owned and ownership is concentrated. Potentially, some individuals in media corporations have a lot of power.

Question 12

What is the pluralist approach to press ownership and content?

Answer 12

Sociologist disagree on how much power and control owners exercise over content. According to pluralists, no single group dominates, all view points are represented within the printed media and consumer demand determines the news content.

Question 13

What is the conflict approach to press ownership and content?

Answer 13

The conflict approach argues that a small group of powerful press owners control the content of news. Recent developments (e.g. Cross-media conglomeration) mean that much of what we read comes from a multinational media.

Question 14

How are news stories selected and presented?

Answer 14

Sociologists study how news is selected and presented. They identify the media’s role in agenda setting and norm referencing.

Question 15

What is the role of the mass media in the process of deviancy amplification?

Answer 15

The media can exaggerate and distort deviance and crime. In doing so, they can amplify or provoke more of it. Such amplification can lead to a public outcry or moral panic.

Question 16

What contemporary social issues are related to the mass media?

Answer 16

Areas of public concern and debate focus on the harmful effects of the media, particularly in relation to children, and anxieties over the internet. Sociological research has informed these debates.

Question 17

Agenda setting

Answer 17

The media have the power to set the agenda. In other words, the media focus on some issues and topics and ignore others. Potentially this could give the media a lot of influence over people’s political views and their voting behaviour.

Question 18

Amplification

Answer 18

The way the media may actually create or make worse the very problems they condemn.

Question 19

Blog

Answer 19

A regularly updated website or web page, typically one run by an individual or small group, that is written in an informal or conversational style.

Question 20

Broadsheet

Answer 20

A newspaper with a large format, regarded as more serious and less sensationalist than tabloids.

Question 21

Censorship

Answer 21

Censorship is the suppression of speech, public communication or other information which may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, politically incorrect or inconvenient as determined by governments, media outlets, authorities or other groups or institutions.

Question 22

Content Analysis

Answer 22

Content analysis is a technique for systematically describing written, spoken or visual communication. It provides a quantitative (numerical) description. Many content analyses involve media - print (newspapers, magazines), television, video, movies, the Internet.

Question 23

Convergence

Answer 23

Media convergence is the merging of mass communication outlets – print, television, radio, the Internet along with portable and interactive technologies through various digital media platforms.

While traditional media involves different devices for different media content-printed format for books, telephones to make calls and radios to listen to music. New media often involves using a single device to do several things.

Question 24

Desensitised

Answer 24

Diminished emotional responsiveness to a negative or averse stimulus after repeated exposure to it.

Question 25

Digital media

Answer 25

Digital media are any media that are encoded in a machine-readable format. Digital media can be created, viewed, distributed, modified and preserved on computers.

Question 26

Folk devils

Answer 26

A group seen as a threat to societies values. Recent folk devils: asylum seekers, single parents, young people (hoodies)

Question 27

Freedom of speech

Answer 27

Freedom of speech is the right to communicate one’s opinions and ideas without fear of government retaliation or censorship.

Question 28

Gatekeeper

Answer 28

A media gatekeeper is a journalist or editor who is tasked with the responsibility of filtering information before it is published, broadcast or posted on the Web.

Question 29

Globalisation

Answer 29

Globalization broadly refers to the expansion of global linkages, the organization of social life on a global scale, and the growth of a global consciousness, hence to the consolidation of world society.

Question 30

Hyper reality

Answer 30

We are, as audiences of the mass media, losing sense of
the difference between the real world and the media
created world. The more information, images and ideas
we are exposed to, the less able we are to separate
reality (the real world) from the media created world.
Also, as technology advances, our ‘real’ world and our
virtual worlds being to blend into one, instead of being
separate.

Question 31

Hypodermic syringe model

Answer 31

Audiences are PASSIVE. This means….
Audiences don’t question media messages, they accept
them.
The media is like a ‘drug’ – as audiences we are injected
with images, ideas, instructions, words, behaviours and
so on that we take on board and act on. We follow media
messages as if they were direct instructions without
considering if we agree with them, or not. For example,
seeing violence on television, and then going out and
attacking someone.

Question 32

Identity

Answer 32

How we see and define ourselves and how other people or groups see and define us.

Question 33

Interactivity

Answer 33

Consumers have an opportunity to engage or interact with the media. E.g. they can press the red button on their digital remotes to explore their own interests, vote in reality shows etc.

Question 34

Mass popular culture

Answer 34

Mass culture is the set of ideas and values that develop from a common exposure to the same media, news sources, music, and art.

Question 35

Moral panic

Answer 35

A wave of public concern about some exaggerated or imaginary threat to society, stirred up by exaggerated and sensationalised reporting in the mass media.

Question 36

News value

Answer 36

News values are general guidelines or criteria used by media outlets, such as newspapers or broadcast media, to determine how much prominence to give to a story.

Question 37

Old/traditional

Answer 37

Traditional forms of media such as newspapers and radio that reach a more limited audience, e.g. local or national and are communicated in a one way process.

Question 38

New media

Answer 38

Media formats that use modern technologies, spreading content using screen based, digital (computer technology) such as the internet or mobile phones, electronic e-books, iPods

Question 39

Pluralism

Answer 39

Pluralism is a view that suggests power in society is spread among a wide variety of groups and individuals, with no single one having a monopoly (control) on power and influence.

Question 40

Propaganda

Answer 40

Information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a political cause or point of view.

Question 41

Postmodern society

Answer 41

Postmodern is a word used to describe changes in ways people think — especially the way they view truth and reality.

Question 42

Readership

Answer 42

The readers of a newspaper, magazine, or book regarded collectively.

Question 43

Semiology

Answer 43

Tthe study of signs and symbols; semiotics.

Question 44

Social networking

Answer 44

The use of dedicated websites and applications to interact with other users, or to find people with similar interests to one’s own.

Question 45

Spin doctor/Political spin

Answer 45

A press agent skilled at spin control. Political spin is a form of propaganda, achieved through providing an interpretation of an event or campaign to persuade public opinion in favor or against some organization or public figure.

Question 46

Stigmatising

Answer 46

Stigmatising to mark a particular social group or individual as different, disapproved of and even dangerous to others.

Question 47

Substitute hearth

Answer 47

The idea that the television replaced the fireplace as a focus of the living room

Question 48

Tabloid

Answer 48

Tabloid popular newspapers generally published in a smaller format than the so called ‘quality press’.