C.

David Mortensen, Communication: The Study of Human Communication (New York:

McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1972), Chapter 2, “Communication Models.”
A.    What is a Model?
1.     Mortensen: “In the broadest sense, a model is a systematic representation of an object
or event in idealized and abstract form. Models are somewhat arbitrary by their
nature. The act of abstracting eliminates certain details to focus on essential factors. . .
. The key to the usefulness of a model is the degree to which it conforms--in point-by-
point correspondence--to the underlying determinants of communicative behavior.”
2.     “Communication models are merely pictures; they’re even distorting pictures, because
they stop or freeze an essentially dynamic interactive or transactive process into a
static picture.”
3.     Models are metaphors. They allow us to see one thing in terms of another.

B.    The Advantages of Models

1.     They should allow us to ask questions.
Mortensen: “A good model is useful, then, in providing both general perspective and
particular vantage points from which to ask questions and to interpret the raw stuff of
observation. The more complex the subject matter—the more amorphous and elusive
the natural boundaries—the greater are the potential rewards of model building.”
2.     They should clarify complexity.
Models also clarify the structure of complex events. They do this, as Chapanis (1961)
noted, by reducing complexity to simpler, more familiar terms. . . Thus, the aim of a
model is not to ignore complexity or to explain it away, but rather to give it order and
coherence.
3.     They should lead us to new discoveries-most important, according to Mortensen.
At another level models have heuristic value; that is, they provide new ways to
conceive of hypothetical ideas and relationships. This may well be their most
important function. With the aid of a good model, suddenly we are jarred from
conventional modes of thought. . . . Ideally, any model, even when studied casually,
should offer new insights and culminate in what can only be described as an “Aha!”
experience.

C.    Limitations of Models
1.     Can lead to oversimplifications.
“There is no denying that much of the work in designing communication models
illustrates the oft-repeated charge that anything in human affairs which can be
modeled is by definition too superficial to be given serious consideration.”
Some, like Duhem’s (1954), believe there is no value in models at all:
 We can guard against the risks of oversimplification by recognizing the
fundamental distinction between simplification and oversimplification. By
definition, and of necessity, models simplify. So do all comparisons. As Kaplan
(1964) noted, “Science always simplifies; its aim is not to reproduce the reality in
all its complexity, but only to formulate what is essential for understanding,
prediction, or control. That a model is simpler than the subject-matter being
inquired into is as much a virtue as a fault, and is, in any case, inevitable [p. 280].”
So the real question is what gets simplified. Insofar as a model ignores crucial
variables and recurrent relationships, it is open to the charge of oversimplification.
If the essential attributes or particulars of the event are included, the model is to be
credited with the virtue of parsimony, which insists-where everything is equal-that
the simplest of two interpretations is superior. Simplification, after all, is inherent
in the act of abstracting. For example, an ordinary orange has a vast number of
potential attributes; it is necessary to consider only a few when one decides to eat
an orange, but many more must be taken into account when one wants to capture
the essence of an orange in a prize-winning photograph. abstracting. For example,
an ordinary orange has a vast number of potential attributes; it is necessary to
consider only a few when one decides to eat an orange, but many more must be
taken into account when one wants to capture the essence of an orange in a prize-
winning photograph.
Models can miss important points of comparison.  Chapanis (1961), “A model can
tolerate a considerable amount of slop [p. 118].”
2.     Can lead of a confusion of the model between the behavior it portrays
Mortensen: “Critics also charge that models are readily confused with reality. The
problem typically begins with an initial exploration of some unknown
territory. . . .Then the model begins to function as a substitute for the event: in short,
the map is taken literally. And what is worse, another form of ambiguity is substituted
for the uncertainty the map was designed to minimize. What has happened is a
sophisticated version of the general semanticist’s admonition that “the map is not the
territory.” Spain is not pink because it appears that way on the map, and Minnesota is
not up because it is located near the top of a United States map.
“The proper antidote lies in acquiring skill in the art of map reading.”
3.     Premature Closure
The model designer may escape the risks of oversimplification and map reading and
still fall prey to dangers inherent in abstraction. To press for closure is to strive for a
sense of completion in a system.
Kaplan (1964):
The danger is that the model limits our awareness of unexplored possibilities of
conceptualization. We tinker with the model when we might be better occupied
with the subject-matter itself. In many areas of human behavior, our knowledge is
on the level of folk wisdom ... incorporating it in a model does not automatically
give such knowledge scientific status. The majority of our ideas is usually a matter
of slow growth, which cannot be forced.... Closure is premature if it lays down the
lines for our thinking to follow when we do not know enough to say even whether
one direction or another is the more promising. Building a model, in short, may
crystallize our thoughts at a stage when they are better left in solution, to allow
new compounds to precipitate [p. 279].
One can reduce the hazards only by recognizing that physical reality can be
represented in any number of ways.