MEDIA AUDIENCE

MEDIA & SOCIETY

BA 2 ND SEM
WHAT IS MEDIA AUDIENCE ??
❑The definition of media audience depends upon one’s
prospective of the role of communication in society. If
we look upon communication as a commodity and
media as a tools for selling the commodities, a ‘media
audience’ would be no better than a potential market
for products and services.
❑On the other hand if we consider communication to
be social good ,a public resource the ‘media
audience’ would be participative & dialogic
community.
❑Further, if communication is a tool for persuasion and
propaganda to promote certain political, religious or
moral views then ‘media audience’ is the masses that
need to be indoctrinated.
❑Media Audiences are both a cause of and a response
to various forms of messages.
Nature of Audience
❑The idea of audience dates back to before advent of
technology dependent modern mass media.
❑Then it was a controlled group like theatre, hall,
churches etc. These groups had the potential to be
controlled by the authority and elicit an institutionalized
form of collective behaviours.
❑The printing press changed the nature of audience for
the first time when it created a reading public.
◦ It created strict divide in audience, Literate & illiterate,
poor & rich, Urban & Rural etc.
◦ Growing commercialization of media also changed the
idea of audience, Communality Media audience
however is more of a controlled group as it is already al
public or social group.
AUDIENCE AS MARKET
❑Commercialization of media with capitalist form of
economies turned audience into market.
❑Media product became commodities for consumption
and audience the consumer.
❑Such audience has dual importance for media. First as
potential consumer of media product and secondly as
a target for advertisement.
◦ This Projects the relationship between media and
audience as a producer –consumer one.
◦ It regards audience as monolith, ignoring the socio-
economic dynamics of the people comprising the
audience.
◦ It even regards audience as having only one
characteristic i.e. of a consumer or buyer. And this view
is from the prospective of media.
Emerging Challenges
◦ Definition of audience from the prospective of
consumer is undergoing change because of the
following :
➢Proliferation of media channel & content.
➢Better interactive media vis a vis internet
➢Social Media.
❑In fact the public has became more individualized
,localized as well as issue specific.
Some theories which can analyse
media audience
❑Hypodermic Needle Theory
❑Two Step Flow theory
❑Uses & Gratification Theory
Hypodermic Needle Theory

◦ The Hypodermic Needle Theory basically means that

the effect of mass media is Direct, immediate and
Powerful.
◦ The most quoted example of media effect theory is the
radio broadcast of H.G.Wells’ War of the worlds.
Two Step Flow
theory

◦ Based on the study of Lazarsfeld

,Berelson and Gaudet , on
political decision making and the
effect of media on 1940’s USA
presidential election campaign
this theory was developed.
◦ This theory negates the bullet
effect of media and says that the
community is more influenced by
a particular segment of people
who are more exposed to media.
Uses & Gratification Theory

◦ This theory is propounded by Elihu Katz, Denis Mcquail

and Michale Gurewitch. This theory study how the
audience use the media according to the gratification
of them.
➢Cognitive need(Acquiring information).
➢Affective Need (Emotion, pleasure)
➢Social Integration need.( Strengthen contact with family)
➢Tension Release. (Escape & Diversion)