Ten things wrong with the media ‘ effects ’ model

2002

From Powerful Effects Model, Minimal Effects Theory, and down to the Active Audience Model, Mass Communication and Psychology Scholars and researchers have sought to examine the effects that mass media messages have on its audience. Nonetheless, there is a recognition of the changing tides where audiences have moved from the position of mere passive consumers of messages to active contributors, and having a say in what to be exposed to and if to accept the message or not.

Matrizes, 2014

This paper presents a bibliographical review of the development of the literature on media effects and it presents a nuanced history of the development of the studies on media effects. This text intends to recover the classical demarcation of literature belonging to the era of (1) unlimited effects, in which the media have complete power over its audience, to the period in which the studies (2) evoked potentially intervening variables in media effects (in determining limited effects), and to the (returning) era of (3) significant effects. The perspective taken in this study focuses on researches that approach the media influence on the attitudes and behaviors of the audience.

This review explicates the past, present and future of theory and research concerning audience perceptions of the media as well as the effects that perceptions of media have on audiences. Before the sections that examine media perceptions and media effects perceptions, we first identify various psychological concepts and processes involved in generating media-related perceptions. In the first section, we analyze two types of media perceptions: media trust/credibility perceptions and bias perceptions, focusing on research on the Hostile Media Perception. In both cases, we address the potential consequences of these perceptions. In the second section, we assess theory and research on perceptions of media effects (often referred to as Presumed Influence) and their consequences (referred to as the Influence of Presumed Influence). As examples of Presumed Influence, we evaluate the literature on the Persuasive Press Inference and the Third-Person Perception. The bodies of research on media perceptions and media effects perceptions have been featured prominently in the top journals of the field of mass communication over the past 20 years. Here we bring them together in one synthetic theoretical review.

1992

Media ctffects should not be thought of as either isomorphic or fragmentary. Instead, the similarities and differences between them should be studied. This approach would offer the potential to determine not only what the media effects are, but how they occur. This is possible through the discovery of patterns in research theories and findings. To this end, the causes, effects, and processes of media influence can be deduced. The causes of media influence can be identified as variations in exposure, ccntent, and the form of the media themselves. There are five categories of media effects: level of analysis, type, nature, intention, and whether the effects are due to nature or form. To illustrate such classifications, two examplbs, reading ability and political participation, can be categorized. The determination of media effects and the underlying processes requires consistency in measuring those effects and in eliminating rival explanations. Therefore, limiting factors, such as permanence and conditional effects, also need to be identified. The limiting factors should determine the research design, measurement strategy, measures, and statistics that are to be used to measure effects. The complex and varied descriptions of "media effects" may have limited the ability to truly understand $?ffects suggesting that it is time to revise tnis concept according to different categorizations and research results. (One hundred and oae references are attached.) (HB)

2013

Does adverting persuade us? Do repeated images of very thin women and very muscular men shape our own body image? Does playing violent videogames make people more aggressive? This course answers these questions and more about the effects of using media in the 21st century. Students will understand how historical mass communication theories apply to modern media and explore the concepts that explain the role of the media in our lives as individuals and as a society. This knowledge will serve as a guide to navigating today’s media industry and becoming critical consumers of media messages.

1996

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The literature of media effects is frequently characterized as a three-stage progression initially embracing a theory of strong effects followed by a repudiation of earlier work and new model of minimal effects followed by yet another repudiation and a rediscovery of strong effects. We argue that although this dramatic and somewhat romantic simplification may be pedagogically useful in introductory courses, it may prove a significant impediment to further theoretical refinement and progress in advanced scholarship. We analyze the citation patterns of 20,736 scholarly articles in five communication journals with special attention to the 200 most frequently cited papers in an effort to provide an alternative six-stage model of, we argue, cumulative media effects theories for the period 1956-2005.

The present work aims to analyze the dynamics of the influence that the media exercise in order to understand how these affect people behaviour and actions, this, focusing on two of the most influencing medias that since last century attracted an always wider quantity of consumers: cinema and television. Special attention will be given to the violent and sexual representations in the American movies. The reason of the choice underlays in the high frequency with which violent and pornographic contents appear on both, the big and the small screen, which makes violence and sex the most influencing themes in media representations. The objective is to prove with a critical analysis taking into account American and European percentages and data over media messages and their consumption, how and why, independently from sex, education level and family influence, the media and the new mediatic communication techniques can actually reshape social dynamics transporting the fictional world in the real one using media texts and psychological techniques as a vector to reach minds and affecting the representation we make and give about reality.