Mass communication, is communication that occurs on a massive scale. The Royal Mail can be used as an example, as it is an extremely large organisation that delivers immense quantities of mail (messages) across an enormous area. (Hartley, 2002) Other examples could be newspapers, magazines, the World Wide Web, and the television, which this essay will focus on later, as they also deliver huge quantities of messages to a large audience. Moreover, mass communication has the power to infiltrate messages into the home, car, supermarket, and even a secluded holiday destination with different forms of technology, i.e. the telephone. Furthermore, the media a contributor to the process of mass communication has made it possible to transfer information over wide distances with considerable speed. (Hartley, 2002)
The media have the potential to distribute certain messages to millions of people, in different countries, all over the world at any given time. In the United Kingdom for instance, at peak viewing times the television has the power to transport messages of different meaning through various channels to around eighteen million people. In addition, it is in some of these messages that people establish their view of the world, of their selves and of their whole society. (Dimbleby, 1998)
There have been a number of health related campaigns circulating the media of late. Consider for example, the ‘Smoking Kills’ campaign issued by the British Heart Foundation (www.bhf.org.uk) with the medium being the television and the application of the Shannon and Weaver model of communication. The British Heart Foundation would be the information source; the transmitter would act as the initial message ‘Smoking Kills’. The receiver In this case would be the audience and the destination would be what sense the audience made of the message and what they did with this information. In theory, this would appear to be a very straightforward, predictable message that can be sent to a heterogeneous audience with constant repetition. However, a person who was already considering giving up smoking may require a great deal of help and support. The message can be repeated constantly, although, without any feedback from the audience the message would be redundant and the person thinking about giving up the habit would probably carry on. Therefore, there would seem to be a lot of interference (noise) to consider when employing a linear model to deliver a message in relation to a health campaign promoted via the media.
Noise is a traditional concept associated with communication theory. Noise is what (Hartley J, 2002 p166) refers to as “The interference that is experienced during the transfer of information between a sender and a receiver.” There are two core forms of noise; they can be either mechanical or semantic. Mechanical noise could be distortion with the channel i.e., snow on the screen or static interference. Semantic noise is intrusion with the actual message brought about by “dissonance of meaning” (O’Sullivan T, etal 1994 p203) usually caused because of language barriers or difference within cultures. In some cases the use of slang or jargon that the receiver of the message is not familiar with also attribute to noise. (Hartley, 2002) Noise can also be related to the environment of the receiver, for example the telephone ringing during the broadcast of a message or another member of the household asking a question and interrupting the receiver’s attention. Some forms of noise cannot be entirely eliminated, however with the use of feedback and redundancy noise can be reduced. (O’ Sullivan 1994)
William Schramm, another pioneer of communication posed a circular model in 1954. This model, (see appendix ii) seeks to disaffiliate from the reoccurrence of the linear model although the initial principles are the same as that of Shannon and Weaver. The encoder of the message is also the decoder and as a person decodes a message they also interpret therefore the message as (Watson J, 1998 p37) suggests is “Sent, received, interpreted, modified, and extended.” Schramm’s model mostly concerns interpersonal communication however, as (Watson J, 1998 p37) proposes “It does not require a great deal of the stretch of the imagination to extend its use to include the media as encoder – interpreter and audience as decoder – interpreter”.
Consider the earlier mentioned campaign promoted by the British Heart Foundation, ‘Smoking Kills’,(www.bhf.org.uk) only this time with the application of Schramm’s model (see appendix ii) instead of Shannon and Weavers model. The encoder, the British Heart Foundation would interpret the message, i.e. ‘Smoking Kills’. The message would be sent through the selected medium and channel, in this case the television. The audience would then receive, decode and interpret the message as to what it means to them and with the advancement of websites, and help lines, which in themselves are two completely different mediums of mass communication, the audience can encode a message and send it back to its original source. Thus eliminating some forms of noise by allowing for feedback to commence.
Another method of eliminating forms of noise would be that of targeting selected audiences in relation to various topics of interest that would be beneficial to people of different, gender, age, and culture at different times of the day. For example, programmes or advertisements concerning children are usually broadcast during the morning or early evening when most children are at home. An advertisement concerning nappies would be televised during the day, as most mothers with child would be at home during the day. (Hartley, 2002) If the media were to target certain groupings, the messages they generate may achieve a greater understanding.
To conclude, Shannon and weavers model of communication is an influential formulation to the theory of communication and would seem beneficial to the media as it delivers the message directly to its selected audience. However, as a model for health related campaigns the model would be redundant, it is typically linear and this can contribute to distortion of the messages perceived by the audience. William Schramms model, in theory would appear to be a more constructive technique of communicating via the media as there is continual feedback involved thus eliminating some forms of interference (Noise) and allowing the audience to perceive and understand the meaning of a certain health related message, and take an active response towards it.
References
Dimbleby,R & Burton,G (1998) More Than Words an introduction to communication. 3rd Edition, Routledge.
Finnegan,R.(2002) Communicating The Multiple Modes of Human Interconnection. Routledge.
Hartley, J. (2002) Communication, Cultural and Media Studies. 3rd Edition, Routledge.
O’Sullivan,T Etal (1994) Key concepts in communication & cultural studies. 2nd Edition, Routledge
Watson,J (1998) Media Communication. Mac Millan Press Ltd.
(Assessed 01/11/05)
Bibliography
Ley, P. (1988) Communicating with Patients. Chapman and Hall
Mc Keown, N (1982) Case studies and projects in communication. Routledge
Appendix (i)
and Warren Weaver model of communication.
http://www.cultsock.ndirect.co.uk/MUHome/cshtml/introductory/sw.html
(ii)
William Shramm s model of communication 1954
http://www.cultsock.ndirect.co.uk/MUHome/cshtml/index.html