How Audiences Consume Media

How Audiences Consume Media

The ways that audiences consume media have changed over time, as the way people think of how they consume it differently each time passes. 

 

• Passive (the 1920s - 1970s) 

Hypodermic Needle Theory - Desensitization

• Active (the 1970s - onward)

Uses and Gratification Theory - Reception Theory

Hypodermic Needle Theory

Is a model of communication suggesting that an intended message is directly received and wholly accepted by the receiver

Believe what the media says, brainwashed.

Desensitization 

Occurs when an audience is repeatedly exposed to shocking or violent content. Repeated experience numbs the effect.

This may be fiction or non-fiction (fact) based media.

Reception Theory

How do people make sense of media texts and claim audiences were active and not passive.

The media has a message for you - Media producers encode their text with meaning - the audience decodes the reader to understand the meaning.

Preferred Reading

The audience decodes the text exactly as the producers intended. Maybe they have the same ideological position. 

Negotiated Reading

The audience understands the meaning and connotations of a text, but they may reject certain elements too.

Oppositional reading

The audience rejects the text's meaning. Might not even engage with the text. 

Gratification Theory 

Actively using the media to satisfy our base's particular needs.

Diversion

A form of escapism from the stress and strain of everyday life. May all media fall into this group. Audiences consume media texts to escape from their daily lives. They choose entertaining readers that allow them to divert their attention from the real world, perhaps by watching a fantasy film. 

Personal identity
The media supplies us with role models and ways of understanding our own place in society. Some audiences like to watch or read media texts because they can compare their life experiences with those represented in them. 

Social relationships 

1. People make a personal connection with the performers they see on the screen.
2. People can build their own relationships by discussing media with friends

Surveillance

People use the media to inform themself about the world around them. Keeping up to date with entertainment/fashion trends. 

Passive Audience

more likely to accept the messages encoded in a media text without challenge and are; therefore, more likely to be directly affected by the statements.

Active Audience

Engages, interprets, and responds to a media text in different ways and is capable of challenging the idea encoded in it.

The media then uses codes and conventions that the targeted audience will enjoy to keep them engaged. Meaning that codes should be applied to everything. 

Demographics

Age

Gender

Social Class

Ethnicity/Race 

Income

Location

Political Leanings

Star Appeal

Psychographics

Personality

Behavior - passive or active

Values

Interests - What do they do in their free time

Spending Habits - What do they spend money on

Target audience

The success of a media product is determined by the audience; give what the audience demands as we get feedback from the audience to improve. Uses codes and conventions that the targeted audience will enjoy and engage with

Genre

Is a way to categorize media products by grouping them together via their shared characteristics. These characteristics in media are known as codes and conventions. 

Subgenre

Categorization of media a step further. It goes beyond the generalization of the genre. 

Genre Convention

Different elements are commonly found in a particular genre.