by definition audience theories are theories that present opposing views about the power of media to influence.
the first one is the HYPODERMIC NEEDLE THEORY which was mainly used in the 1920s and 1930s. it is know as the closed communication theory were the audience is passive and just takes in ideas that are being portrayed. the audience is powerless and has to accept what is being shown to them. this method was used many many politicians. if i may give an example, being an IGCSE history student, i did learn about hitlers policy of propaganda he used. he also had a separate minister of enlightenment who was Joseph Goebbels, he made sure that all germans heard the message of the nazis and what they were trying to and bring about. he was also successful and he changed every thing in Germany, he changed the entire education system so that it followed nazi values. there was also a great excess to the radio as it was present almost everywhere and people could hear his speeches. there were also loudspeakers on the streets so people could hear important announcements, making it extremely hard to avoid them.
the second one would be the BOBO DOLL EXPERIMENT by Albert Bandura in 1961. having already studied about this experiment in psychology i know that, this experiment was an unethical experiment, which is hypothesis was if children copied violent behaviour projected by a model or media in this case. in this experiment the children were exposed to 3 scenarios of violence towards the bobo doll. by the end of the experiment it was concluded that children who had been exposed to aggressive behaviour exibited twice as much aggression than the control group.
the GRATIFICATION THEORY by Blumer and Katz. this theory is the actual opposite of the hypodermic needle theory. in this theory the audience is active and can interpret media texts according to the way they think. unlike the hypodermic needle theory they consume what they want in the way they want and it is not the media the consumes them. in this people pick up a media piece because they want to and wish to for their own gratification and pleasure. they can use these texts for- diversion, escapism, learning, social identity, pleasure, social relationships, sexual stimulation, aggression and violence, etc.
next is the TWO STEP FLOW THEORY by Katz and Paul Lazarfeild in 1944. this theory suggests that the information first has to go through the leaders and is filtered by them. thus the audience is passive and is influenced by the leaders. another simple word for this theory could be censorship.
lastly is the RECEPTION THEORY by stuart hall in the 1970s. this theory states that the creator of the media text encodes the media text and the audience has to decode this message to understand it. a great example of this would be this particular artist, who is currently very famous, BTS. their music videos have references to a seprate different storyline that they have created through their albums and music videos, and fans try to decode them and come up with a message that they are trying to send. this theory also states that there are 3 kind of audiences- dominant, negotiated and oppositional.
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