To what extent do the mass media influence their audience?

Authors Avatar

Colin Malloy

To what extent do the mass media influence their audience?

It is generally believed that daily newspaper’s, television, radio, films, the Internet, or any form of message communication that is targeted at a large audience has an influence on behaviour, (Moore 1996) but to what extent? How much influence do the ‘mass media’ really have on society and the individual’s within a society that have now become a media ‘loyal’ audience? (Moore 1996) and how do people gauge the extent of this influence? The aim of this essay is to look at the theories of the mass media effects. Such effect theories as the ‘hypodermic-syringe’ model, the ‘cultural effects’ theory, the ‘two-step flow’ model, and the ‘uses and gratification’ theory, and then determine from these theories the true extent of the mass media influence upon society.

The ‘Hypodermic-syringe model’, that is also referred to as the ‘silver bullet model' (Schramm & Porter 1982) is the idea that the mass media are so powerful that they can 'inject' their messages into the audience. Or that, like a magic bullet, they can be precisely targeted at an audience, who irresistibly fall down when hit by the bullet. In brief, it is the idea that the makers of media messages can get people to do whatever they want them to do. (Schramm & Porter 1982) Whilst it could be argued that no media analyst holds such a view today, it remains popular amongst the public and the media moralists. For instance, in the aftermath of the murder of a young child, Jamie Bulger, in the United Kingdom in 1993 by two young boys, the video of ‘child’s play 3’, in which a similar kind of murder was to be seen, was evoked as a cause of the murder. (Macionis & Plummer 1998 p593) Whilst it is possible to say that the film may have played a part, along with other factors, it cannot be said to have simply caused the two boys to murder the young child. (Macionis & Plummer 1998) Another factor was that the senior police officers that interviewed the two young boys at the time agreed that there was no evidence that either child had even seen the video of ‘child’s play 3’. (J. Petley 1994)

Many theorists believe that it is really more of a folk belief than a model. (Chapman 2000) It could be argued that methodologically, the model is very weak because it ignores the fact that social characteristics of audiences differ in terms of class, age, gender and ethnicity. (Chapman 2000) But still the theory that people are passively injected with media messages crops up repeatedly in the popular media whenever there is an unusual or grotesque crime, which they can somehow link to supposedly excessive media violence or sex and which is then typically taken up by politicians who call for greater control of media output. (Schramm & Porter 1982) If it applies at all, then probably only in the rare circumstances where all competing messages are rigorously excluded, such as in a totalitarian state. Nazi Germany being a prime example, where ‘Dr Joseph Goebbels’ centrally controlled the mass media, and in doing so, he influenced a country into believing that Adolf Hitler was the ‘saviour’ of Germany. (Wistrich 1997) As you read through the various approaches however, it could be argued that a rather weaker version of the ‘hypodermic syringe’ model underlies many of them, notably in the 'cultural effects' approach.

Join now!

The ‘cultural effects’ approach or the ‘mass-culture’ theory, as it is otherwise known implies that ‘some’ of the media audience will accept media messages rather uncritically and in other cases resist media messages. (Haralambos & Holborn 2000)   Clearly this suggests not only different types of media messages but also the idea of different audiences. (Haralambos & Holborn 2000) It could be argued that the media actually target these ‘different’ audiences, these cultures, and effect the way these people look upon the world. The idea is that the mass media have created a mass culture in society, but, at the ...

This is a preview of the whole essay