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USES AND GRATIFICATIONS: BLUMLER AND KATZThis theory represents a change in thinking, as researchers began to describe the effects of the media from the point of view of audiences. It looks at the motives of the consumers of media, questioning why we choose to watch the things we do. Thus the audience is made active as it recognises their choice to consume what they want.The theory argues that the audience have social and psychological needs which generate certain expectations about they are exposed to. Again this is reinforcing the idea of an active audience who making motivated choices, essentially controlling the media instead of the other way round.

Blumler and Katz broke the model down into four needs:1. Surveillance2. Personal Identity3. Personal Relationships4. Diversion

SurveillanceThis need claims people feel better when they believe they know what is happening in the world around them. As an audience, we feel more secure when our need for knowledge is fulfilled, which is why we watch the news, look at websites, read newspapers etc.

Personal IdentityBeing a subject of the media allows an individual to confirm their identity and position within society. Often messages, values or even certain people within the media are relatable for an audience and therefore help them define themselves. Songs and music videos, such as Christina Aguilera’s Beautiful sometimes specifically target this need.

Personal RelationshipsAudience members can form a relationship with the media itself and use it to form relationships with others. Many people use TV as companionship, forming relationships with characters to the extent where they ‘grieve’ if the character dies. This can cause the formation of false identities, wherein the audience dislikes an actor because they portray a bad character within the media. The media can also be used as a springboard to form relationships with others – families use TV as a stimulus for conversation and having TV shows that you like in common can form friendships.

DiversionThis refers to escapism, using the media as a way to stop thinking about your life and problems. Audiences watch music videos, films, TV etc. to forget about their own lives and distract themselves from it.

RECEPTION THEORY: STUART HALLHall’s theory claims that media texts are encoded by the producer, meaning that whoever produces the product fills it with messages and values. The text is then decoded by spectators in different ways, and possibly not in the way the encoder intended.

Spectators can have one of three readings of a text:1. Dominant or preferred2. Negotiated3. Oppositional

Dominant Reading• The audience view the text in the way the producer intended it to be viewed• They agree with the ideology in the text• E.g. A woman sees a handbag advert that implies she will be glamorous and successful if she buys the

handbag. She agrees with this message and goes and buys the handbag

Negotiated Reading• This is a compromise between agreeing and disagreeing• The audience agrees with some aspects of the text but may see others differently• Often the audience see the text at face value, recognising how it’s trying to influence them and therefore not

letting it do so fully• E.g. A woman sees a handbag advert that implies she will be glamorous and successful if she buys the

handbag. Although she agrees that the handbag will make her feel that way, she doesn’t buy it – perhaps because of the price or the material it’s made out of. She is questioning the ideology behind the text

Oppositional Reading• The audience completely rejects the intended reading and creates their own instead• They disagree with the messages the producer has put into the text and do not read the advert in the preferred

way• E.g. A woman sees a handbag advert that implies she will be glamorous and successful if she buys the

handbag. She sees it as a stereotypical, degrading representation of women and so does not buy the handbag because she disagrees with the ideology

HYPODERMIC NEEDLE THEORYThis theory, developed in the 1920s and 30s, states that the media injects messages and information into its audience. It is a linear communication theory, seeing the media as having a direct, immediate and powerful influence on a passive audience. When the theory was developing, the increasing popularization of TV and radio along with the emersion of persuasion industries such as propaganda contributed to the ‘strong effects’ that it had.The theory works on the simple model that the sender (in this case the media), injects messages in the receiver – whether it’s an individual or a large group audience. It assumes the receiver will then instantly accept the injected message, thus portraying the media as a dangerous form of communication that makes an audience powerless to form their own opinion.An example of this theory is the 1930s broadcast of ‘War of the Worlds’. To make the story more realistic, they broadcast it in the style of a real news report. This meant people tuning in halfway through actually believed the Earth was being invaded by Mars, showing how the theory can result in mass hysteria.

This theory is widely considered irrelevant today due to its outdated beginning and the following flaws:

• It assumes the receiver will agree with the intended message yet more recent theories like Stuart Hall’s demonstrate that different people read media in different ways

• The Two-step Flow theory similarly disputes this, describing a middle man between the sender and receiver which affects the way the audience understand the text

• The theory doesn’t consider the wide variety of means of communication that modern media has, or consequently the different ideologies behind these media sources

• It was created for a less media-saturated society, and so is outdated now• Audiences are not simply passive as this theory claims, we know from theories like Uses and

Gratifications that audiences can be considered to control the media by choosing what to consume