PUBLIC RELATIONS PRACTICE

2014 Week 3

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DR KANE HOPKINS

12Relevant models

Public relations campaigns

The current situation in New ZealandChild abuse and domestic violence are two of New Zealand’s most pressing problems

– NZ has the fifth highest rate of child abuse in the OECD

– A child dies of abuse every five weeks – Almost 60% of all reported violence in New

Zealand is family related – Research shows the police only hear about 20%

of all family violence incidents and 10% of sexual violence offences

The culture of drinking in New Zealand• 20% of NZers aged 15 years or more who drank

alcohol in the past year has a potentially hazardous drinking pattern

• One-third of all Police apprehensions involve alcohol

• Half of serious violent crimes are related to alcohol

• Over 300 alcohol-related offences are committed every day

HERD MENTALITY

HERD MENTALITY

Poindexter says:!Check out more about this on a Freakonomics podcast

Please reduce energy in your home in order to reduce the expenditure of resources on the planet

Please reduce energy in your home in order to reduce the expenditure of resources on the planet

Please reduce energy consumption in the home in order to save money

Please reduce energy in your home in order to reduce the expenditure of resources on the planet

Please reduce energy consumption in the home in order to save money

Please reduce energy consumption so future generations will have access to these resources

Please reduce energy in your home in order to reduce the expenditure of resources on the planet

Please reduce energy consumption in the home in order to save money

Please reduce energy consumption so future generations will have access to these resources

The majority of your neighbours are regularly undertaking efforts to reduce energy in their homes, please follow.

PUBLIC RELATIONS CAMPAIGNS

What is a PR Campaign?• A strategic and focused approach to

communicating with a desired audience • Employs a range of activities and media • Mostly one-way communication • Outcome of communication is determined by

communicator

PCCs definedPublic communication campaigns can be defined as purposive attempts to inform or influence behaviours in large audiences within a specific time period using an organised set of communication activities and featuring an array of mediated messages in multiple channels generally to produce noncommercial benefits to individuals and society.

(Rice & Atkin, 2009)

The three Es that influence behaviour

Education

Engineering Enforcement

The three Es that influence behaviour

Education

Engineering Enforcement

Smoke-free Environments Act 1990 Public Act 1990 No 108 Date of assent 28 August 1990 Commencement see section 1

All public relations programs and campaigns should be based on theories.

(McElreath, 1997)

Categories of theory1. Theories of communication!

• The Shannon–Weaver model of communication!• Hypodermic needle model!• Situational theory!• The public sphere!

2. Theories of receivers response!• Behavioural public relations model!• Social exchange theory!

3. Theories of practice!• Four models of public relations!• Systems theory

MODELS

The Shannon–Weaver model of communication

Hypodermic Needle Model

• Infers that a message is directly received and accepted by “helpless audiences”

• Largely considered obsolete today.

• Provides a tool to categorise publics’ perceptions of a situation and their subsequent behaviour

• It is used to identify in segment an organisation’s publics into four categories; – non-public – latent public – aware public – active public

Situational theory of publics

Key factors

Level of involvement !The extent to which people perceive that what an organisation that involves them

Key factors Level of involvement !The extent to which people perceive that what an organisation that involves them

Problem recognition!People know something should be done about the situation and think about what to do

Key factors Level of involvement !The extent to which people perceive that what an organisation that involves them

Constraint recognition!People perceive the obstacles that limit their ability to do something about a situation

Problem recognition!People know something should be done about the situation and think about what to do

Non-publics!Experience no consequences from issue

STP categories

Non-publics!Experience no consequences from issue

Latent publics!Experience consequences from issue but are not aware of it

STP categories

Non-publics!Experience no consequences from issue

Latent publics!Experience consequences from issue but are not aware of it

Aware publics!Are aware of the issues and consequences but have not become active on the issue

STP categories

Non-publics!Experience no consequences from issue

Latent publics!Experience consequences from issue but are not aware of it

Aware publics!Are aware of the issues and consequences but have not become active on the issue

Active publics!Are aware of the issues and actively seek information about the issues

STP categories

High recognition

Low recognition

Low !involvement

High !involvement

Latent !publics

Active !publics

Aware !publics

Non-!publics

High recognition

Low recognition

Low !involvement

High !involvement

No!abuse

Tax!payers

Kids!

A woman calls police

• Habermas (1989) propose the notion of a 'public sphere', where citizens are able to rationally discuss and debate issues in social, mediating environment

• The public sphere operates between the political sphere and the private sphere

• The public sphere is threatened by large and powerful organisations. These entities can overwhelm the public sphere, dominating communication

• The need for equality in these relationships is essential • With our quality, communication can become

strategic; that is, used as an instrument of force

The Public Sphere

Behavioural PR Model

• SET revolves around equity in relationships • In PR, SET is based on the premise that people

want balanced relationships and not feel like they ‘owe’ others

• People make judgements about the comparison of alternatives based on a subjective cost–benefit analysis

• Where there is a perceived imbalance in a relationship, rational entities will communicate in some way to regain balance

Social exchange theory

SET suggests…• Individuals choose those alternatives from which they

expect the most profit • Cost being equal, they choose alternatives from which they

anticipate the greatest rewards • Rewards being equal, they choose alternatives from which

they anticipate the fewest costs • Costs and other rewards being equal, individuals choose

the alternatives that supply or can be expected to supply the most social approval (or those that promise the least social disapproval)

• Costs and other rewards being equal, individuals choose statuses and relationships that provide the most autonomy

SET suggests…• Other rewards and costs equal, individuals choose

alternatives characterised by the least ambiguity in terms of expected future events and outcomes

• Other costs and rewards equal, they choose alternatives that offer the most security for them

• Other rewards and costs equal, they choose to associate with, marry, and form other relationships with those whose values and opinions generally are in agreement with their own and reject or avoid those with whom they chronically disagree

• Other rewards and costs equal, they are more likely to associate with, marry, and form other relationships with their equals, than those above or below them

• Grunig and Hunt (1984) • The theory that is the most influential over

modern public relations • A set of public relations typologies

Four Models of Public Relations

Press Agentry• The earliest PR model to appear was press agentry or publicity

• Characterised as one-way, source-to-receiver communication

• Its purpose is largely propagandistic and the truth is sometimes expendable

• Press agents did little research aside from monitoring the media in which they sought to place favourable articles about their clients.

• P. T. Barnum epitomises the model

Press Agentry• The earliest PR model to appear was press agentry or publicity

• Characterised as one-way, source-to-receiver communication

• Its purpose is largely propagandistic and the truth is sometimes expendable

• Press agents did little research aside from monitoring the media in which they sought to place favourable articles about their clients.

• P. T. Barnum epitomises the model

Public Information• In 1920s press agentry model lost credibility with

journalists because they had been deceived by too many times

• Ivy Lee developed the Declaration of Principles and sent it to journalists

• He stated that journalists could expect accurate information from his PR agency

• Communication still one-way but now adhering to the truth as being important

• The model is predicated on the idea that if the public has sufficient information and that information is truthful, then the public will believe and behave in ways that are helpful to the client.

Two-Way Asymmetric Model• The two-way asymmetric model relies on two-

way communication: from source to receiver and back to source

• The communicator attempts to change the beliefs or behaviour of a public, but is not willing to change its own beliefs or behaviours

• Imbalanced effects • The two-way asymmetric model relies heavily on

research about the target publics

Two-Way Asymmetric Model• The research is conducted through attitude

surveys and focus groups • Practiced extensively today by many businesses

and PR agencies • A limitation of the public information model is that

public failed to believe or behave in the desired way – Despite having accurate and truthful

information

Two-Way Symmetric Model• The ideal form of communication according to

Grunig and Hunt • mutual understanding • two-way balanced communication • high, formative and evaluation of understanding

• The TWSM advocates relationship building through dialogue, listening, negotiation and gained mutual understanding

• Dialectic Communication Perspective

References: !Habermas, J. (1989). Structural transformation of the

public sphere. Cambridge: MIT Press. !McElreath, M. (1997). Managing strategic and ethical

public relations campaigns (2nd ed.). Dubuque, IA: Brown & Benchmark.