There is however complications with this method as when a message via the media is received to audiences, to understand it fully researches must have the capability to evaluate the message in all the different ways that audiences perceive it within their different cultures. However this would be very stereotypical as within different cultures audiences are able to perceive messages differently to others, for example not all young black, working class females think in the exact same way as everyone has a mind of their own.
Similar to above, the ‘uses and gratifications’ model states by Blumler and McQuail (1968) that people are capable of choosing exactly what they want out of the media. Stressing the fact that people use the media for different purposes, i.e. comfort, support or just family entertainment, this model also views the audience to be active choice makers. Dennis McQuail (1972) identifies the following types of uses why individuals turn to the media: Diversion (escape from every day life), Personal relationships (viewing other people’s love lives), Person identity (exploring and gaining a sense of our own identity) and surveillance (knowing what is going on in the world). This theory fully supports the statement that ‘the media only exerts a limited influence’ as they provide the message but following that it is up to the person viewing the information to acknowledge the message and choose their own acknowledgement of it. An example of this is the soap Coronation Street; an old person may watch this for companionship as they may feel that they can relate to a particular character. However an older teenager may watch this soap for advice on their own relationship with their parents by viewing the consequences of particular relationships on screen between characters such as ‘Sarah-Louise and Gail Platt’. A criticism that is held against this model however is that it fails to examine why exactly people have these different needs and why they choose different interpretations.
Contrasting these two models altogether are the ‘Hypodermic syringe’ model and the ‘Cultural Effects’ model which both view audience as being passive and inactive.
The view by Vance Packard (1957) appeared to demonstrate the mass media to be so powerful to the extent that they could ‘inject’ any media message they wished to into their audiences. This is known as the ‘Hypodermic Syringe’ model in which audiences are viewed to be passive (inactive), homogeneous (all the same) and ‘blank pages’ (ready to be written on). An example of this model would be a TV programme demonstrating crime in London by black youths. The Hypodermic syringe theory would suggest that all views, whatever class, gender, age or experiences would accept the dominant view presented by the media and may believe that all young, black youth from the South are criminals. This model doesn’t allow any exceptions whatsoever and fails to recognise different social characteristics of the audiences. This is a criticism of this model as in society different people have different lives and beliefs based on all kinds of different factors such as their state of life, their work or education and people aren’t robots that can be controlled as easily as this model declares. It is apparent that realistically audiences are not as vulnerable and easily manipulated as this model depicts. However a study was conducted by psychologists Bandura, Ross and Ross (1963) looking for a ‘cause-and-effect’ relationship between media messages and audience response. Concluding that film images are as effective in teaching aggression as real life models are, they found especially boys imitate actions and words from violent films that they have seen.
Also viewing the media to be extremely powerful towards all groups in society, cultural effects model recognises that actually people have very different backgrounds and experiences and this allows them to interpret things in different ways. However this model also assumes that the audience is passive to some extent as they believe media producers expect the audiences to respond in a particular way. The response that they identify with is an anticipated ‘preferred or dominant reading’ response in which if you lack the experience about a particular theme, i.e. a programme about America (not everyone has been there) are likely to accept the programme as ‘preferred reading’. An example of the type of reaction demonstrated by this model would be a programme on television about posh, upper class females living in Devon. This may be interpreted by some people that all females in Devon are snobby and stuck up or for other people who may have visited Devon will accept this view as a diversity in society as they will recognise that not all females in Devon are stuck up or snobby. The Marxist view of this model depicts that the ruling class exert their ideology by continually bombarding audiences, destroying their critical viewpoint. Consequently the ideas of the dominant groups in society become known as being correct without audiences realising it. The model does have its differences from the hypodermic syringe model as it doesn’t involve an immediate effect on audiences as it suggests that the dominant views are processed to audiences via a ‘drip drip’ process over a long period of time rather than an instant ‘injection’ of media messages. This model doesn’t however support the assertion that the media exerts only a limited influence over their audience as it still promotes the audiences to be passive and inactive.
It is obvious that there are two different ways of viewing media theories, those that state that the media has full control over it’s passive audiences: ‘The Hypodermic Syringe’ model and the ‘Cultural Effects’ model, and those that believe that the media only exerts very little influence over it’s audiences, ‘Uses and Gratifications’ model and ‘Structured Interpretation’ model. Due to the strong criticisms aimed at the ‘inactive audience approaches’, such as the fact that they see audiences as homogeneous and vulnerable, which clearly is a false statement as it can be proven that different people interpret texts differently by David Buckingham (1993) who discovered that the ways in which people interpret media can be based on their independent level of media literacy. I personally believe that models like the Hypodermic Syringe model provide a very narrow, naïve view towards society and underestimate the levels of diversity amongst all people as it is comprehensible that humans are not robots. However the active model approaches in my opinion, give a very realistic view of how the media can influence others as due to cultural factors, experiences, personalities and peers, we are capable as active choice makers to decide what information to accept and reject and we are fully capable of having our own personal opinions. The evidence supporting the active model approaches is quite recent, Morley 1980 and Blumler and McQuail 1968. Since then there has been no further evidence to suggest that these models portray an incorrect view of society and that actually the inactive models are more realistic.
