MEDIA EFFECTS THEORIES

Cultivation Theory

 Developed by George Gerbner

 Central Claim: Persistent long term exposure to TV content has small
but measurable effects on the perceptual worlds of audience members.
 Heavy TV viewing creates an exaggerated belief in a “mean and scary
world.” (Gerbner)
 TV has surpassed religion as the key storyteller of our (US American)
culture.
 Vicarious experience?

Video Screen Time

How much television do you watch on an average day?

 4 or more hours?
 2-4 hours?
 Less than 2 hours?

How much time daily to you spend on the internet or playing computer
games?

On-Screen Time
Television Viewer Profiles

 Heavy viewers: 4 or more hours a day

 Moderate viewers: 2-4 hours a day
 Light viewers: less than 2 hours a day

These distinctions can be applied to Internet and computer game users

Cultivation Theory Research

Content analyses of prime time television
--The “TV world”
--The Violence Index

National surveys of TV audience

--Classify as heavy, moderate & light viewers
--Survey concerning perceptions of real world
Calculate Cultivation Effect (or “Cultivation Differential”)
--Overall (“across the board”) effects
--Subgroup breakdowns (Mainstreaming, Resonance) as well.

Cultivation Differential
The difference in the percent of people giving the “television answer” within
comparable groups of light and heavy viewers.
Examples: Comparing light and heavy viewers among college students;
among teachers; among senior
citizens.

Cultivation Effects
Why do cultivation effects differ among subgroups? Two explanations:
Mainstreaming: Heavy viewers from different groups develop a similar
outlook.
Resonance: TV content “resonates” with real life experiences to amplify the
cultivation effect in certain groups.

What About TV Violence?

 According to Gerbner, violence is TV’s principal message.

 Although other media have violent content, television violence is the
most significant.
 In the 1970s, 2/3rds of prime-time programs contained violence or the
threat of violence (Gerbner, 1980).
 What about today?
 According to Gerbner, elderly, children, Latinos, African-Americans,
women, and the less educated are most often the victims of TV
violence.
 TV places marginalized people in symbolic double jeopardy by
simultaneously under-representing and over-victimizing them.
 What about today?

Social Action Theory

 Developed by Anderson and Meyer

 ”For most of the history of research in mass communication, content
has been seen as a silver bullet shot from a media gun to penetrate a
hapless audience" (Anderson & Meyer, p. 48).
 Audiences are not hapless nor passive.
 Media audiences participate actively in mediated communication; they
construct meanings from the content they perceive.
  Social action theory sees communication interaction in terms of
actors’ intent, receivers' interpretations, and message content.
 Meaning is not delivered in the communication process, rather it is
constructed within it.
 Each communication act generates at least three separate and
potentially different sites of this construction.

Meanings arise in:

1. The intentions of the producer.
2. The conventions of the content.
3. The interpretations of the receiver.

Using Social Action Theory

 Determine the intentions of the media creator (e.g., producer, actor,

writer).
 Examine the media content (visual, verbal, musical, etc.)
 Identify possible receiver interpretations.
 Assess the possible effects on receivers (including you).

Media Effects: An Example

Cover Story: By Dan MacMedan for USA TODAY, 26 February 1999
How Bad is Wrestling for your Kids?

TV Wrestling

 Two big enterprises - WCW (owned by Turner/Time-Warner), and

WWF (owned by USA Networks).
 On three nights a week.
 Pay-per-view events monthly.
 Over 40 million viewers
 Wrestling target audience- Men from 18-34
 33% of viewers are under age 17
 13% are between age 6-11
 Often, 7-8 of the week’s 10 top-rated cable shows are wrestling
programs.

Modeling Behavior?
A report released this week presents data from a study conducted by Indiana
University and Inside Edition. The research team monitored 50 episodes of
“WWF Raw” between Jan.12, 1998 and Feb.1,1999.
A sampling of specific incidences and the number of times the behavior
occurred:

 Grabbing/pointing to one’s crotch - 1,658

 Giving the finger - 157
 Simulated sexual activity - 128
 Satanic activity - 47
 Simulated drug use - 42
 Urination, talking about/appearing to - 21
 Character appearing as a prostitute -20

Media Effects-Music Video?

Do music videos have messages?
Apply social action theory:
--intentions of the artist/producer
--content features
--viewer/receiver interpretations
Any likely effects?

Agenda-Setting Theory
The Agenda: Not what to think, but what to think about.
The Theorists: Maxwell McCombs & Donald Shaw

About the theory:

 It contrasts with the selective exposure hypothesis of cognitive

dissonance, reaffirming the power of the press while maintaining
individual freedom.
 It aligns well with social judgment theory.
 It contrasts with the selective exposure hypothesis of cognitive
dissonance, reaffirming the power of the press while maintaining
individual freedom.
 It is consistent with a “use and gratification” approach to television
viewers’ motives (and dependency theory).
 It represents a back-to-basics approach to mass communication
research, with a focus on election campaigns.
 In political media, who sets the agenda?
 If we weren’t here tonight, how many of us would be watching Monica
and Barbara (the Lewinsky interview)?

Agenda Setting?
  Media agenda and public agenda: a close match.
 McCombs and Shaw assert that the agenda-setting function of the
media causes the correlation between the media and public ordering of
priorities.
 However, correlation does not prove causation.

Agenda Setting: Who are the people most affected by the media
agenda?

 Those susceptible have a high need for orientation or index of curiosity.

 Need for orientation arises from high relevance and uncertainty.

Agenda Setting: Which issues are boosted by media attention?

 The media seem particularly effective in creating public interest in

political candidates and campaign strategy.
 Agenda-setting researchers now realize that the campaign itself is the
primary issue.
 Does the impeachment trial illustrate this?

Agenda Setting: Do priming and framing dictate what people think?

 Priming is “a psychological process whereby media emphasis on

particular issues not only increases the salience of those issues, but
also activates in people’s memories previously acquired information
about those issues.”
 Framing calls “attention to some aspects of reality while obscuring other
elements, which might lead audiences to have different reactions”
(McCombs & Shaw)

Media Dependency Theory

 Developed by Ball-Rokeach and DeFluer

 Key Idea: Audiences depend on media information to meet needs and
reach goals.
 Key Idea: Social institutions and media systems interact with
audiences to create needs, interests, and motives in the person.

The degree of dependence is influenced by:

1. The number and centrality of information functions. Media functions
include:
 Entertainment
Monitoring government activities
Education
Social Cohesion
2. Social stability
When social change and conflict are high; and established institutions, beliefs,
and practices are challenged; people make new evaluations and choices. In
such cases of instability, reliance on media may increase.

Media Dependency Theory: Some Questions

 Do media create needs?

 Do people turn to media to achieve gratification and satisfy needs?
 Are media needs personal, social, cultural, political, or all of these?
 “The media are our friends”??