Audience theories

Hypodermic needle:

A hypodermic needle is the message in texts are injected into the audience by powerful media. The audience is powerless to resist, therefore the media works like a drug and the audience is drugged, addicted, doped or duped. The hypodermic needle suggests that the mass media could influence a very large group of people directly and uniformly by shooting or injecting them with appropriate messages designed to trigger a desired response. They express the view that the media is a dangerous means of communicating an idea because the receiver or audience is powerless to resist the impact of the message.

Reception theory:

The reception theory is an active theory that analyses the relationship between producer and audience. The theory suggests that when a producer constructs a text is it encoded with an important meaning or message that the producer wishes to convey to the audience. Audiences will then correctly decode the message or meaning and understand what the producer was trying to say. In some instances, the audience will either reject or to fail to understand the message that was provided by the producer. The three ways that the audience could interpret the readings are through dominant or preferred, negotiated and oppositional.

Uses and Gratification theory:

Uses and gratification theory suggests that people use the media and its many texts to their advantage and in order to meet their individual needs. The theory describes mass communication, as it provides an immediate approach that is centred around the audience. It deals with how and why people adopt specific media to satisfy their needs. Uses and gratifications theorist explain why people choose and use certain media forms. The theory emphasizes a limited effect position; that is, the media have a limit he effects on their audiences because audiences are able to exercise control over their media.

Copycat theory:

Copycat theory is when audiences will copy what they see in a media text. It refers to how the media can influence and affect the audience’s behaviour and how they think. The copycat theory relates to something which is publicised in the media that creates a lot of attention. The well known example of this is copycat murders. Audiences react differently to various situations as they have different interpretations. An individual perceives a form a behaviour describes or portrayed by a character in media content.

Desensitisation theory:

Desensitisation theory is the theory of a media audiences’ reactions growing weaker according to the level/amount of exposure to violence, death and sex. A decrease in fear and sensitivity to extremely aggressive behaviour and taboo subjects, and possible introduction to every day life.

Catharsis:

Catharsis is the process of releasing, and thereby providing relief from. Strong or repressed emotions.

Cultivation theory:

The cultivation theory is a theory that insists that television is responsible for our perceptions of day to day norms and reality. It means that every television show that you watch has some sort of hold on the way you perceive the real world situations. The communication studies of media uses this theory and this theory does not exist without television shows.