Effects theory

 

Audience theory: key notes and terminology

Passive & Active

Passive: This is the view that audiences passively take in information from the media and that these messages have the same effect on everyone.

Active: This is the more modern and generally accepted view that audiences interact with and make conscious choices regarding the media they consume.

Hypodermic Needle Theory

This is the suggestion that audiences are always passive and therefore take the intended message from the producer as if it was injected into their minds. This assumes no individual difference in audience members. 

Two-step flow theory

This is the theory that consumers form their opinions based on opinion leaders like newspapers, politicians and, nowadays, celebrities.

Uses and Gratifications - Blumler & Katz

INFORMATION/SURVEILLANCE: learning information that you did not already know or that is useful for living (e.g. documentaries; weather or traffic). 

IDENTITY: personally relating to something - seeing your lifestyle on screen.

DIVERSION/ENTERTAINMENT: escapism and being entertained away from your normal life.

RELATIONSHIPS: social interaction, caring about characters or celebrities, forming relationships e.g watching a soap opera for a long time because you care about what happens to long-standing characters.

The 3 Vs

VISCERAL PLEASURE: Physical thrill of watching something e.g hairs on the back of your neck in a horror film, sport, big explosions. 
VICARIOUS PLEASURE: Experiencing something through the characters. 
VOYEURISTIC PLEASURE: Watching people e.g hidden camera shows / elements of reality TV like Big Brother.

1) Write a definition of a passive audience: Audience accept the preferred reading and passively take in the information the is being given

2) Write a definition of an active audience: When the audience challenges ad engages with the Media Text 

3) Write a definition of the hypodermic needle theory: The suggestion that the audience will take in everything just the same as everyone else, and we all look at it the same if there is a message.

4) Write down a media product for each category of Blumler and Katz's Uses and Gratifications theory and why it fits that particular audience use/gratification: 

Information/ surveillance: A documentary , eg. blue planet. Links to diversion/ entertainment. Can be good for an audience that really likes to learn new things, and watch very factual things.

Identity: shows like The bachelor, Bad girls club, Love Island. This is links to Vicarious pleasure and Voyeuristic pleasure . People who enjoy watching reality TV, seeing how people live and deal with certain things.

Diversion/ entertainment: Being able to escape reality in a show, The hunger games, James bond. Links to Visceral pleasure. Audiences who really like to watch entertaining films and escape from reality.

Relationships: social interaction, caring about characters or celebrities, forming relationships. Links to voyeuristic pleasure and vicarious pleasure.

5) Re-watch the clip from Blue Planet above and write a paragraph analysing how elements of the clip offer the audience pleasures or gratifications (use media terminology from Uses and Gratifications theory and the 3 Vs - notes outlined above). 

Blue Planet is a very factual, interesting show, it's also got reality in it because it shows the natural habitat and how animals live and adapt to their environment. Because of this I think its a vicarious pleasure and voyeuristic pleasure. It's got hidden cameras filming animals and describing what goes on. It also makes the audience a part of it, because of how peaceful it is, how close the shots are etc. It's also an information/ surveillance grafication.