Mass Communication Theory: Foundations, Ferment, and Future

By Stanley J. Baran & Dennis K. Davis

 Chapter 5
THE CONSOLIDATION OF THE MEDIA-EFFECTS TREND
1950 TO 1960
• The media effects trend came to dominate mass
communication theory and research
• This happened during a very stable and
productive decade in American history
• In this decade television displaced newspapers,
movies and radio to become the dominant mass
communication medium with 559 stations
serving over 90% of all households
 Chapter 5
Learning Objectives
• 5.1 Explain how the media effects trend was consolidated
into a dominant approach to media research.
• 5.2 Understand the contribution of Robert Merton to the
development of middle-range theory and its importance for
media effects research.
• 5.3 Understand the strengths and weaknesses of several
foundational but still important mass communication
theories such as information-flow theory, two-step flow
theory, phenomenistic theory, and mass entertainment
theory.
• 5.4 See the value and drawbacks of applying functionalist
theories and systems theory to explaining media influence.
Why Did Postpositivism and the Media-Effects
Trend Achieve Dominance?

• Advocates for the media-effects trend argued it was based on factual

evidence collected using powerful new postpositivist research methods
• Postpositivist research was quite effectively promoted as the best way to
develop social science disciplines
• Mass society theory was rejected as highly speculative; not systematically
grounded in empirical observation; not verifiable using scientific methods
• Postpositivist research methods were initially applied in media industries
as a means of measuring audiences and later provided more in-depth
research on audiences
• Limited effects findings were consistent with what media elites wanted to
believe about media; they provided a powerful basis for rejecting
arguments favoring censorship or strict regulation of media
 Is Limited Effects Theory Wrong?
• Theories can never be proven “wrong” - they just become
less useful as inconsistent evidence accumulates or better
theories are developed
• We have gradually become aware of the many limitations of
empirical research methods so we have less confidence in
some evidence and are more open to competing evidence
gathered using other methods
• Limited effects theory assumes that it is possible and
necessary to prove the validity of causal models of media
influence – until recently it was quite difficult to gather the
type of evidence necessary to test such models
• Media researchers have recognized that research shouldn’t be
focused only on the study of specific effects; they need to
take a broader approach to media theory and research
 Even Limited Effects Can
Have Major Consequences
• A 1% shift in voters in certain areas can change
the outcome of an election – this is happening
with increasingly regularity in US presidential
elections
• A 1% shift in product sales make the difference
between advertising success or failure
• A 1% increase in aggressive behavior could
adversely affect tens of thousands of children
 Middle Range Theory
• Proposed by Robert Merton in the 1950s
• He argued it was a new type of theory that could bridge the
gap between macroscopic speculation and microscopic
empirical observation
• Middle range theory should develop as empirical observations
are collected and compiled
• Many of the media effects theories developed from 1960 to
1990 can be viewed as middle range theories
• Middle range theory provided a powerful rationale for
developing media effects theories based on empirical
research
• Middle range theory also provided a powerful rationale for
rejecting speculative, macroscopic theories
 Middle Range Theory and Functional
Analysis
• Merton argued that functional analysis provided a useful way
to develop middle range theory
• In a functional analysis the study of society begins with
systematic observation of the “functions” of social artifacts
(like media)
• Functional analysis has been widely used by anthropologists
to assess cultures and their use of artifacts
• Researchers try to identify and study the purposes or
functions served by artifacts
• Functional analysis of media involves assessing what people
do with media and the consequences of these uses
 Types of Functions

• Manifest Functions = Intended and easily

observed consequences

• Latent Functions = Unintended and hard to

observe consequences
 Social Media Functions

• Manifest Functions:
– Entertainment; pass time
– Social Relationships; sociability
– News
• Latent Functions:
– Personal Identity
– Parasocial Interaction
– Narcotizing Dysfunction
 Discussion of Functionalism

• What are the advantages of functionalist

theories?
• Why are these theories criticized as being too
accepting of the status quo?
• Do you think that positive functions of media
always balance negative functions?
 Information Flow Research

• Conducted during the 1950’s and 1960’s

• Based on surveys and field experiments
• Identified many barriers that interfere with
the accurate flow of information from elite
sources to the general population
• The most extensive research on information
flow was sponsored by the US Government as
part of the overall Civil Defense effort during
the Cold War with the Soviet Union
 DeFleur and Larsen Research on the
Flow of Civil Defense Information
• Conducted in small, isolated towns in Washington
• Thousands of brochures were dropped from planes in
an effort to assess the effectiveness of such brochures
in transmitting information during a nuclear attack by
Soviet bombers
• Residents who found brochures were instructed to pass
information along to others just as they would do
during an actual attack
• Very few people even bothered to read the brochures;
children were most likely to pay attention
• To get a useful response 8 brochures had to be
dropped for every resident
 The Coffee Slogan Research
• The researchers decided that people ignored their brochures because they
the brochures announced a simulated rather than an actual attack
• They developed a field experiment in which they picked out certain
houses in a small town and then asked people to remember and pass
along a coffee slogan for a new brand of coffee; people were promised
free coffee if they told a neighbor about the coffee and taught them the
slogan
• The researchers returned a week later and interviewed neighbors. Many
neighbors knew about the coffee but garbled the slogan. Many
remembered slogans for existing brands of coffee.
• Conclusion - it is difficult to get accurate information to flow from one
person to another even when there is a good incentive
• Development of the CONELRAD emergency broadcasting strategy made
brochures obsolete as a means of transmitting civil defense information
but the barriers to information flow identified by DeFleur and Larsen were
reconfirmed in many other studies
Lazarsfeld’s Research on Personal Influence
• A large survey was conducted in Decatur IL in 1944 and
its findings were published in 1955 (Katz and Lazarsfeld)
• The survey probed how housewives made decisions
about shopping, fashion, movies and politics
• The research was funded by MacFadden Publications – a
publisher of magazines aimed at middle class women
• The research focused on whether information/influence
flow was horizontal or vertical – between women of
similar social status or from higher status women to
lower status women?
• The research used a “snowball” sampling method to
identify opinion leaders and followers
 Two-Step Flow Hypothesis
• The Decatur Research led to development of the
Two-Step Flow Hypothesis which states that:
– Information and influence flows from media to opinion leaders and
then from leaders to followers
– Most influence is between leaders and followers at the same level in
society = horizontal flow
– Opinion leaders are more likely to use media and to have more social
contacts
– Opinion leaders are found at all levels of the community and serve as
an effective barrier to the flow of problematic information and ideas
– Evidence of the two-step flow was strongest for shopping and fashion
but weakest for politics
• This finding seemed to demonstrate that personal influence
was more important than media influence and has been
labeled as the single most important finding in the history of
media research
 Discussion of The Decatur Research

• To what extent is the two-step flow finding the result of

focusing research on women rather than men?
– In the 1940s women were more likely to talk to and be
influenced by friends and neighbors about fashion,
movies, marketing, and politics
– Would the same thing be true today?
– Is there a two-step flow of influence from social media?
– How does information flow to you from social media
• Are you and opinion leader or follower
• Do you lead on some areas and follow in others?
• Are there people on the internet who are your leaders?
• Do you have followers on the Internet?
 Klapper’s Phenomenistic or
Reinforcement Theory
• Media have a direct influence only when
special circumstances break down the normal
barriers to influence
• Media normally reinforce the status quo
– Provide people with information to fit their
existing attitudes
– Legitimate existing political leaders and social
institutions
 Reinforcement Effects Are Important

• Even when product advertising doesn’t increase

overall sales in a product category it can:
– Maintain product sales at levels that can be met by suppliers
efficiently
– Prevent drastic drops in product consumption
– Make consumption of products meaningful so that people feel good
about buying brand name rather than generic products
– Create subtle social pressure to consume name brand products
– Steer consumption toward specific products rather than others
 Mass Entertainment Theory
• A functionalist theory of TV effects developed by Harold
Mendelsohn
• TV provides an inexpensive, convenient way for people to
satisfy various psychological needs
– Entertainment
– Pass-time
– Forget problems; escape
• If TV didn’t satisfy these needs people would find other
ways to satisfy them
• The negative functions of TV are balanced by positive
functions
 Social Media = Minimal Effects?
• Rise of partisan political media enables people to choose
media that largely reinforce their existing political beliefs
• It is relatively easy to routinely use a set of media (cable TV
channels, news websites, blogs, talk radios shows) that
reinforce either conservative or progressive political beliefs
• But is political polarization a “minimal effect?”
– What if political beliefs aren’t changed – just strengthened and made
less vulnerable to change
• Could polarization increase to levels where social stability is
threatened?
– Consider what happened when there was extreme polarization in the
1960s; violent protests were common and there were political
assassinations
 Systems Theory

• Alternative to functionalism
• System = Set of interrelated parts interlinked so that changes
in one part cause changes in other parts
• Computer-based media such as the Internet link all of us into
networks that are complex systems
• Systems theory directs attention away from effects on
individuals and toward processes involving many people
linked into networks
• Systems theory is often concerned about the way in which
systems relate to their environment
 System Models

• Interdependent Parts
• Self-regulation of the system
• Goal-orientation of the system
• Open versus Closed Systems
• Dynamically Balanced Systems
• Second-Order Cybernetic Theory
– Potential for transformation
 Questions that can be Asked about
About Media Effects
1. How is a specific effect manifested?
2. How widespread is an effect?
3. What types of content are associated with the effect?
4. What types of people are likely to experience the effect?
5. Is the effect direct and immediate or indirect and gradual?
6. Do other things cause the same effect?
7. Are there things in the social world and/or things in people’s minds that
predispose people to be influenced by media in certain ways?
8. How powerful are media in producing the effect?
9. What responsibility do media have for enhancing or preventing the
effect?
 Review of Learning Objectives
• 5.1 Explain how the media effects trend was consolidated
into a dominant approach to media research.
• 5.2 Understand the contribution of Robert Merton to the
development of middle-range theory and its importance for
media effects research.
• 5.3 Understand the strengths and weaknesses of several
foundational but still important mass communication
theories such as information-flow theory, two-step flow
theory, phenomenistic theory, and mass entertainment
theory.
• 5.4 See the value and drawbacks of applying functionalist
theories and systems theory to explaining media influence.