Mass Media TheoryHow do media affect us? How do the images we see change us?

• Media theorists have tried to measure what effects the media have on us.

• As a result, theories have come and gone over the decades.

• Powerful effects theory, or magic bullet theory – Belief that mass media have a profound, direct effect on people.

• Based on Walter Lippmann’s 1922 book Public Opinion, which said that the pictures in our heads are shaped by media. Now discredited.

• Minimal effects theory – Believes that the media’s effects are indirect.

• Based on studies done by Paul Lazarsfeld of Columbia University.

• Opinion leaders – Part of minimal effects theory that says influential people in a person’s life that have more control over beliefs and information than the media (e.g., a teacher, a supervisor, a clergy member).

• Cumulative effects theory – States that the media’s influence collects, or accumulates, over time.– Created by German

scholar Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann

– Cites advertising campaigns that repeatedly hammer same message

• Spiral of Silence model – Belief also by Noelle-Neumann that majority viewpoints intimidate minority voices, hindering the “marketplace of ideas” concept.

• Agenda setting– Process by which

issues bubble up into public attention through mass-media selection of what to cover• Scholars Maxwell

McCombs and Don Shaw said media don’t tell public what to think, but what to think about

• Many instances where media set direction for important events

Maxwell McCombs

Don Shaw

• Socialization – The process of learning how to fit into society.

• Media reflect the changes taking place in the world.

• Role models – People or characters whose behavior, actions are imitated by others.

• Stereotypes – Broad characterizations of people, either by a demographic group or other trait.

• Cultural imperialism – One culture’s dominance over another.– Created by Herbert

Schiller, whose 1969 book Mass Communications and American Empire warned about Western culture undermining cultures of other lands.

• Motivational research – Seeks subconscious appeals that can be used in advertising.– Based on Ernest Dichter,

who believed like Freud that the mind is unconsciously susceptible to suggestion.

• Subliminal message– One that cannot be

consciously perceived

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• Observational learning – Theory that people learn behavior by seeing it in real life or in depictions of real life.

• Cathartic effect – Belief that people release any violent tendencies they have by watching them portrayed in the media.– Aristotle subscribed to

this theory in ancient Greece.

– Seymour Feshbach found evidence for this theory in modern times.

• Aggressive stimulation – Theory that people are inspired to violence by media depictions.

• Bobo doll studies by Albert Bandura– Showed violent film to

children

– Children showed violent tendencies toward a doll.

• Catalytic theory – States that media-depicted violence has a contributing role in violent behavior, but not a triggering one.– Factors include:

• Whether violence portrayed in media is rewarded

• Whether media exposure is heavy

• Whether a violent person fits other profiles

• Desensitizing theory – States that tolerance of real-life violence grows because of media-depicted violence.

– The Basketball Diaries, a 1995 film that has a dream sequence of a classroom shooting, was widely criticized after Columbine and other school shootings.

• George Gerbner – Believed in what he called the “mean-world syndrome”– Syndrome says people

who see violent images believe world is scarier than it really is.

– As a result, these people will in time be more willing to accept less freedom to ensure their safety, possibly leading to a police state.