Media Audience

Question 1

George Gerbner

Cultivation Theory

Answer 1

It suggests that television is responsible for shaping, or ‘cultivating’ viewers’ conceptions of social reality. The combined effect of massive television exposure by viewers over time subtly shapes the perception of social reality for individuals and, ultimately, for our culture as a whole.

Question 2

Stuart Hall

Reception Theory

Answer 2

The theory suggests that:
- when a producer constructs a text it is encoded with a meaning or message that the producer wishes to convey to the audience
- In some instances audiences will correctly decoded the message or meaning and understand what the producer was trying to say
- In some instances the audience will either reject or fail to correctly understand the message
Stuart hall identified three types of audience reading (or decoding) of the text:
DOMINANT OR PREFERED
- Where the audience decodes a message as the producer wants them to do and broadly agrees with it
NEGOTIATION
- Where the audience accepts, rejects or refines elements of the text in light of previously held views
OPPOSITIONAL
- Where the dominant meaning is recognised but rejected for cultural political or ideological reasons

Question 3

Clay Shirky

End of Audience Theory

Answer 3

• No longer a passive audience because we are now more of an active audience, more likely to share and comment due to the explosion of technology
• Newspaper and magazine circulation is declining due to the preference of a digital version
• Daily Mirror and the Times now have an online version so that they can access a wider audience
• Also believe that the audience wants to speak back to the producers, and interact with those making media, saying what we like and don’t like
• More equality of power and less of a hierarchy of producers to audience.

Question 4

Henry Jenkins

Fandom

Answer 4

INCOMPLETE

Question 5

Albert Bandura

Media effects

Answer 5

INCOMPLETE