Introduction to Media Studies, S4, G3

Professor Youssef EL KAIDI

Media Effect Theories

Why it is important to know?

Media in uence the audience and create a certain e ect

Media suggest to people what to think about and talk about
Theories of media e ect acknowledge that media can
in uence people to think, feel and take action about what they
want and what they are told to want!

There are many media e ect theories, but we will focus on the
lling:

1. Hypodermic Needle Theory (Magic Bullet Theory)

2. Two-step Flow Theory
3. Cultivation Theory
4. Uses and Grati cation Theory
5. Agenda Setting Theory
6. Framing Theory
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1. Hypodermic Needle Theory
This is the earliest media e ect theory
Media inject miss/information into audiences’ minds

This theory assumes that mass media have a direct, immediate, and powerful effect on
audiences

This theory assumes that a widely disseminated media message automatically has a
widely assimilated effect

During World War II, media were instrumental propaganda tools to shape people’s
opinions and attitudes ff
 Magic Bullet Theory
This is another name for the hypodermic needle theory
Magic bullet/hypodermic needle theory were
known during the early era of mass media
(1920s-1930s), especially radio, television and
newspaper.
The MBT assumes that mass media are the
sources of propaganda
The impact/e ect of mass media directly and
strongly hit the audience to the extent that
mass media owners can easily manipulate
and control the audience’s attitudes and
opinions (Katz and Lazarsfeld, 1955)
Both HNT and MBT show that media are
platforms for persuasive communication,
“telling people what to think and believe.”
(Scheufele and Iyengar, 2011)
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Critiques on Hypodermic Needle Theory
Audience are assumed as passive
consumers of information
Media are seen as powerful and strong
enough to change to change people’s
attitudes
People are assumed to have the same
reactions to the same media messages
irrespective of situational and personal
di erences
These theories were not developed from
empirical research but on the assumption
that humans react in the same way to the
same stimulus. (Lowery and De Fleur, 1995)
 Two-step Flow Theory
In uences stemming from mass media rst reach “opinion leaders” who, in turn, pass on what they read and hear to those they
in uence (fans, followers, etc.)

This theory is proposed by Paul F. Lazarsfeld, Bernard

Berelson, and Hazel Gaudet.
It suggests that “ideas often ow from radio and print to
the opinion leaders, and from them to the less active
sections of the populations” (Robinson, 1979: 305).
There are three hypotheses of the two(step ow theory:
1. Media to opinion leaders: Media message reaches
opinion leaders at the rst stage
2. Media to the less attentive/interested: People who are
less interested in media receive less information from
media
3. Opinion leaders to the less attentive: Less attentive
people who less access to media receive information
from their opinion leaders
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 Cultivation Theory
The more you watch TV, the more you are in uenced by its messages

This theory was introduced by George Gerber 1960s

It suggests that “heavy television watching cultivate conceptions of reality in

viewers who are consistent with the world presented in television dramas”
(Gerbner and Gross, 1976)

Continuous exposure ton violent and criminal actions in television programmes

can a ect the audience to think of their world as full of violence and crimes
(Gerbner et al, 1977)

High frequency of violence in the form of many characters on television can

in uence people to see violence as an appropriate behaviour in some conventional
situations (Gerbner et al, 1978)

Television and media in general cultivate a symbolic culture which is then used by
viewers to interpret everyday reality. (Gerbner and Gross, 1976)

In general, cultivation theory explains how heavy exposure to cultural imagery can
shape conceptions of reality among the users. (Hughes, 1980)
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Critiques on Cultivation Theory
Do video games make people violent?
Only talks about TV effects

Assumes that the effect of TV-

watching are homogenous and the
same for all viewers

Focuses on heavy viewers

Nowadays, scholars apply this

media theory for other types of
media consumption
 Uses and Gratification Theory
It’s about what people do with media not what media do to people
People use media and media gratify
people
“people bend the media to their needs
more readily than the media
overpower them; that the media are at
least as much agents of diversion and
entertainment as of information and
in uence.” (Katz, 1973: 164)
U&G Theory enquires why do people
use media and what do they use them
for? (McQuail, 1983)
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Five Elements of Uses and Grati cation
Theory
1. Audience are conceived as active
2. People have various media choices
and needs of grati cation
3. The media compete with other
sources for need satisfaction
4. Every audience member is self
aware of their own media use,
interests and motives
5. Audience’s orientations and needs
are explored on their own terms, not
other people’s judgements.
 Agenda Setting Theory
Media choose what people should think about

This theory was suggested by McCombs and Shaw (1972)

“In choosing and displaying news, editors, newsroom sta , and
broadcasters play an important part in shaping political reality.
Readers learn not only about a give issue, but how much
importance to attach to that issue from the amount of information
in a news and its position. ( MaCombs and Shaw, 1972: 176)
“The mass media set the agenda for each political campaign,
in uencing the salience of attitudes towards the political issue.”
(McComb and Shaw, 1972)
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The Mechanism of Agenda Setting
 Framing Theory
Media de ne the reality for its consumers

Framing Theory explains how mass media select certain issues to be

reported continuously in order to shape mass opinion. (Iyendar 1991,
Scheufele 1999)

“To farme is to select some aspects of a perceived reality and make them
more salient in a communicating text, in such a way as to promote a
particular problem de nition, causal interpretation, moral evaluation, and/
or treatment recommendation for the item described.” (Entman, 1993: 53)

Framing e ects refer to communication e ects that re not due to

di erences in what is being communicated, but rather to variations in how
a given piece of information is beings presented (or framed) in public
discourse. (Scheufele and Iyengar, 2011: 3)

Framing is conceived of as a second level agenda setting which refers to

the impact of leading media coverage on audience’s interpretations of
news stories.
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