Have you ever wondered how the media we consume impacts us as audiences? Considering how much exposure we have to all sorts of media in our everyday lives - whether this is through Netflix, Instagram, or advertisements on the train - it's important to think about how it affects us.
While there's no single explanation for how media content impacts our norms, values and behaviour, there are a number of sociological theories that seek to address this phenomenon. Let's look into them!
- In this explanation, we'll be looking at media theories.
- We will start by outlining the meaning of media theory and mass media. Then we will look at different types of media audience theories.
- We will discuss the uses and gratification theory, devised by Jay G. Blumler and Elihu Katz.
- We will then look at the audience reception theory as well as the end of audience theory.
- We will analyse the cultivation theory.
- Finally, we will discuss the media dependency theory.
Meaning of 'media theory'
Media theories are used within sociology to explore how the media affects society. They are important to learn about as new technologies are constantly changing the way mass media operates and affects people's thoughts, beliefs, and behaviours.
Mass media refers to media sources that reach a large audience. Newspapers like The Sun, which are consumed globally, are examples.
Types of media theory
Media audience theories relate to how people choose, consume, and are affected by media. They explore the specific relationship between the audience and media. As more media is being consumed every day, sociologists find it important to explore this dynamic.
Let's study some of the primary sociological perspectives on the effects of media on audiences.
Uses and gratification theory
Jay G. Blumler and Elihu Katz devised the 'Uses and Gratification' theory in 1974. This approach states that we as consumers consciously choose what we want to see in media, depending on our needs and preferences. There are four given reasons for our choices:
Integration and social interaction: this is when we consume media for the sole purpose of being able to relate to others about it. For example, if everybody at school is watching a new TV show, you are likely to go and watch it just to be able to speak to everyone about it.
Fig. 1 - There are many reasons for our use of media, the most common being entertainment.
Audience reception theory
Stuart Hall created the 'Audience reception' theory in 1973, focusing on the idea that each piece of media has intended messages from its creator. These messages can be interpreted in three hypothetical ways by the receiving audience:
Preferred reading: when the consumer fully understands the intended message.
Negotiated reading: when the consumer understands the message but adapts it to suit their values.
Oppositional reading: when the consumer disagrees with the intended meaning.
Active audiences
Hall's theory also explores the idea of active and passive audiences.
Active audiences are those who question any aspect of the messages behind a media text.
Passive audiences are those who unconsciously absorb the messages without question.
Hall's reception theory suggests that audiences are active rather than passive, as they must think about the media they are consuming to form one of the above readings.
End of audience theory
Clay Shirky's 'End of audience' theory addresses the idea that modern audiences are turning into creators. It's a new theory that explores the sociological side of social media.
Shirky argues that audiences are no longer passive due to the way social media operates. Technology has changed our behaviour; instead of just consuming media passively, we also contribute to it.
In his argument, no audience is passive.
Before new media technologies, audiences would simply consume a film and that would be it. Now, audiences consume the film and then create a YouTube review of it or post about it on their Instagram account - they are creating media content. This is why it is named the 'End of audience' theory, as Shirky believes the audience has now become the creators.
The Bobo Doll Experiment
This refers to a study conducted in the 1960s by Albert Bandura to explore the effects of media on children. Bandura created the 'Bobo doll' experiment to examine how children react to violent media, investigating the hypothesis that the media can put ideas directly into the minds of the audience, particularly if they are young and impressionable.
Bandura split the children into two groups. To one group, he showed a video of adults being violent toward the Bobo doll, while the other group saw the doll being treated normally. He subsequently sent the children one by one into a room with a Bobo doll and analysed their behaviour. He found that the children who were exposed to the violent behaviour were aggressive towards the doll, while those who weren't, didn't behave violently.
Bandura concluded from this study that if children see violence on TV or in media generally, they will replicate it.
Fig. 2 - Bandura found that children tend to replicate representations of violence in the media.
Cultivation theory in media
George Gerbner's cultivation theory, developed in the 1960s, explores the audience's perception of reality. He studied the amount of TV people consumed and the way they answered questions about crime in society.
The responses he received from the 'heavy' TV consumers were often a huge overestimation or underestimation of the actual rates of crimes.
The statement 'elderly people are more likely to be victims of violent crime than other age groups' is true when it comes to TV. Almost 4 out of 10 elderly characters are shown as victims, especially older women. However, when looking at official statistics, violence against elderly people is lower than any age group in society.
Gerbner termed this vast difference between 'TV reality' compared with actual reality the 'cultivation differential'.
According to him, media consumption cultivates specific assumptions, expectations, and conceptions of social reality. The topics and representations on TV also reinforce mainstream ideologies.
Put simply, Gerber argued that the more we see certain representations in the media, the more we believe them, often leading us to accept the ideologies presented to us.
Media dependency theory
Media dependency theory further expands on Blumler and Katz's 'uses and gratifications' theory.
Created in 1976 by Sandra Ball-Rokeach and Melvin DeFleur, media dependency theory is the idea that the more dependent someone is on a certain type of media, the more important that media will be in their lives. So, the more frequently we use certain media, the more likely we are to become dependent on them.
A suitable example to illustrate this is social media. Sites such as Instagram have become essential for a wide variety of jobs. Some are dependent on Instagram for every aspect of their livelihood, e.g. small online businesses and entrepreneurs. If it were to suddenly stop working, these people and businesses would be greatly affected.
In addition to this, media dependency theory aims to show that when there is a change in the world, particularly socially or economically, our dependence shifts to different sources.
For instance, consider the recent COVID-19 pandemic. This completely changed the way that we use technology. In particular, we can look at how this affected our use of online technology to complete our daily tasks: work, school, and university all adapted to being online.
As we used these technologies so often, we became dependent on them. This started to affect the way we use them even after the worst of the pandemic was over.
Media Theories - Key takeaways
- Media theories are used to explore the relationship between people and media. Audience theories look at the way we as audiences consume media and how it affects us.
- 'Uses and gratification theory' states that we as consumers consciously choose what we want to see in media, depending on our needs and preferences.
- 'Audience reception theory' looks at the three ways in which media texts can be interpreted; preferred reading, negotiated reading, and oppositional reading.
- 'End of audience theory' addresses the idea that modern audiences are turning into creators, while the 'Bobo doll' experiment examined how children react to violent media, concluding that they replicate the violence.
- 'Cultivation theory' argues that the more we see the same representations in media, the more likely we are to believe them. 'Media dependency theory' is the idea that the more dependent we are on media, the more important media will be in our lives.
Explanations 
Exams 
Magazine 
