Audience theories

• Bandura media effects

  • if an audience sees aggressive behaviour, they are likely to mimic it
  • Bobo dolls
  • the idea the media can implant ideas into the minds of the audience directly
• Gerbner cultivation

  • the more we see representations, the more we believe they are true
  • exposure to repeated patterns of representation over long periods of time can shape and influence the way we perceive the world around us (cultivating ideologies)
• Stuart Hall Reception

  • 3 ways audiences respond to texts
  • preferred - how producers intended audiences to respond
  • negotiated - understand the message but adapt it to suit their own values
  • oppositional - audience disagrees with the intended meaning
• Jenkins Participoatory culture

  • the internet has allowed fans to gather and create their own texts and easily share their work
  • instead of just consuming text, audiences are creating them
• Shirky end of audience

  • we are now more likely to use the internet and other technologies to respond to texts and create our own
  • audiences are no longer passive in the age of the internet