Week 2- Mass Comm Work - Lecture notes Agenda Setting and Framing Theory PDF

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Agenda Setting and Framing Theory Notes with Toby Rosenthal and Christina Morus...

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#43 September 29th, 2020 ( Intro To Mass Communication (COMM-1201-091 -Week Two Bold- important things - Agenda Setting and Framing Theory : Core Assumptions 1. The media do not just reflect reality, they filter and shape it 2. Media concentration on a few issues/subjects leads the public to perceive those issues as more important than others 3. Different media have different agenda setting potential … GATEKEEPING ● Control over the selection of content usually in the hands of a few news editors or “higher ups” who act as guardians of information ● News media act as gatekeepers of information, making choices about what to report and what not to report – deciding what information a public will receive as “news.” ● What the public know/care about at any given time is mostly an effect of gatekeeping Agenda Setting: The ability of the news media to signal to the public which issues are important, what we should pay attention to (Explains the correspondence between the rate at which media cover a story and the extent to which people think that this story is important) News media function NOT by telling people what to think, but by telling them what to think about ● ● ●

Gatekeeping is key to the agenda-setting process. After determining which stories are “allowed through the gate,” news agencies then take those stories that “make the cut” and decide which are more and less important. In deciding which stories to highlight and which to down-play, news media signal to the public what is important thereby “setting the agenda” for public discussion/opinion

Priming: Drawing attention to some aspects of political & cultural life at the expense of others (The public is “primed” to understand a given issue as important because it was covered, and because of the emphasis that was placed on that issue through its strategic (. placement in news media Agenda setting- WHICH stories are told Framing- HOW stories are told : Cultivation Theory Cultivation Theory: Predicts and explains the long-term formation and shaping of perceptions, understandings and beliefs about the world as a result of the consumption of media messages .Developed by Hungarian-born media scholar George Gerbner from his . research over a 20+ year period at The University of Pennsylvania Television has long-term effects which are small, gradual, and indirect but cumulative and .significant

. Mass media cultivate attitudes and values which are already present in a culture TV is essentially and fundamentally different from other forms of media (1 cultural story teller TV shapes our society’s way of thinking and relating (2 The influence of TV is limited-but-powerful (3 The effects they suggest are effects on the attitudes rather than the behaviors of viewers Mainstreaming- The effect of heavy TV viewing whereby heavy viewers come to see . reality as more similar to that portrayed in TV than reality ○ Heavy viewers tend to see the world a scarier place then it really is due to the violent world TV cultivates for them Heavy viewing leads to more homogeneous opinions than among light viewers ○ .( (who tend to have more heterogeneous or divergent opinions Resonance- A sort of double dose effect that amplifies people’s perceptions that TV reflects an accurate reality - Reinforcing your assumptions about the world. For example, if a heavy viewer is an actual victim of violence, s/he will be convinced that the media reality is in fact real The Mean World Syndrome: The effect of heavy TV viewing whereby heavy viewers come to see the world as a nastier, scarier place then it really is due to the violent world TV . cultivates for them ○ ○

Heavy viewers tend to believe that the world is a nastier place than do light viewers of similar backgrounds. Gerbner’s research suggests that violence on television does NOT make people more violent. Instead, Gerbner’s research suggests violence on television DOES make heavy viewers more fearful

: Media effects Media Effects: Understanding the relationship among the media you consume and their influence on you ”? What is “The Media ● Premise 1- the specific medium or technology through which a message is conveyed influences the style of the message, with pictures and graphics often making up as much or more of the messages as the words itself. (Media messages and images help shape how we view the world, and what we understand and misunderstand about events, people, and places around the globe.) Walter Ong- three types of media in the world’s history, oral, written and ○ electronic Each medium creates a different way of thinking, feeling, and different ■ states of awareness how public discourse is practiced in a given culture will depend on the ■ type of media that is privileged in that culture !! Marshall McLuahn - the medium is the message ○ How we think about the world is dependent on the media we use ■ Medium used to transmit message will impact audience’s perception ■ Not only do media create different meanings for audiences, they also ■

restructure and reshape the human experience Premise 2: It is our responsibility as democratic citizens to think critically about the ● messages we receive and to think critically about the way media shape our worldview, ! our way of knowing ”. There is no such thing as “unbiased ● Everything has a point-of-view ● Because we are deeply immersed in our media environment, we rarely think ● . about our participation in it But we are active participants – we are audience, we are consumers, we are ● ” creators; without us there is no “them Premise 3: Media reflect AND shape the social, economic and political structures in our . culture, and encourage people to hold certain values and opinions Media messages often produced and disseminated by large organizations, ● . companies and/or people with money and access These groups are called culture industries because they play a large role in ● . shaping, producing and influencing culture Money$$$ = power = access so it is important to understand how big business ● can influence our tastes, perceptions, etc. through media Premise 4: Media are both productive and reflective ● Media messages both reflect and shape broader culture ● Not a one-way street, but a relationship ●

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Stage 1: The Power Effects Paradigm During the 1st ½ of the 20th century (around WWII) media research focused on how to rally citizens behind the war effort Researchers generally believed that mass media cast magical, persuasive effects on audience War of the Worlds Broadcast ○ WWI Propaganda ○ This idea that mass media had great inherent power to persuade audiences used a macroscopic lens Macroscopic approaches look at audiences as uniform, and do not account for ○ . differences across media or across various audience groups

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The concept that media can inject a public with a certain way of thinking is called the Hypodermic Needle Theory ● Assumes media messages have a direct and powerful effect on audiences, media has the power to tell people what to think and how to behave ? Problems with this ● Pre-supposes all humans think the same way ● Assumes all humans will react the same way to the same message ● Does not account for the fact that people interpret messages based on their own experiences, values, beliefs, etc. These interpretations may be different that the way the sender intended them Stage 2- The Limited Effects Paradigm- By the 1960s, mass media research began to look at the limits of media on shaping public opinion - the limited effects paradigm ❖ a body of media theory based on the assumption that, because people are capable of critical, independent thought, mediated messages really have no influence over public

thought. Limited Effects Paradigm- Afforded greater agency and individual responsibility to publics while ; dismantling the conception of an all-powerful media influence Undermined assumptions about an all-powerful media, emphasizing social ● relationships and individual psychological processes Began to look at what kinds of messages attracted people, why people ● interpreted messages differently, and why people remembered different things. (” (People as “choice makers Initial studies within this paradigm DID demonstrate that people had MUCH more ● free-will and critical thinking capacity than the “hypodermic needle model” suggested Soon became clear that this “limited-effects paradigm” did not adequately ● . account for actual material cultural media-effects For example: cultural “homogenization” of tastes and styles, beauty standards, ● issue-specific knowledge & opinions, etc., or the extent to which a given story . was considered important to the wider public By the 70s and 80s researchers began to look at more specific effects of mass ● communication. A new paradigm developed Stage 3- Limited But Powerful Effects Paradigm- Media’s effects may be limited, but in those areas where media messages do influence audiences, those effects are powerful Emerged from the realization that although people were not just empty vessels ● waiting to be filled with any garbage beamed to them from the television, it was also not quite accurate that mass-media messages had no influence on public . thought while media influence is NOT all-powerful, mass-media messages DO have ● some effect/influence on some aspects of individual and public thought, and in . those areas, this influence can be powerful Message effects Studies of the messages being sent and how people are affected by the content ● ● ● ●

Cognitive effects… effect of messages on short term learning of information Attitudinal effects… effect of media messages on people’s opinions/attitudes Behavioral effects… effects of media messages on actions or behavior choices Psychological effects… effects of media messages on people’s emotional state

Medium effects ? How does the medium being used affect how the message is received (” Remember McLuhan…”The Medium IS the Message ) Active Audience effects

How do the intended and unintended audiences impact the way a message is created and ?received . Seeks to determine how audiences interpret messages ● ● How individuals seek-out and respond to different messages at different times for different reasons ● ? Are audiences victims of the media or choosey consumers ●

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Ownership effects Studies of the ways in which ownership of a given media outlet influences the messages ( (and hence the audience’s perceptions Owners are “gatekeepers” when it comes to news ● We can get different messages from different owners ● Also can influence entertainment media ● Which books are published? Which films are made? What changes need to be made within those texts? Etc. Corporate concentration also an issue...