Entry 4 – Improvement Plan 18/10/2011

I need to improve upon how I have applied Audience Classification Theory in my written reports. Although I feel confident in my knowledge of how Media Producers Define and Target an Audience, I haven’t applied this knowledge effectively. I intend to rewrite both my reports for Unit 6 and show that I have a thorough understanding of Audience Classification and Audience Reception of Media. I will reference appropriate examples such as the Hypodermic Needle and Uses and Gratification Models to explain how audiences are interpreted by large media producers, and then subsequently how these models help them to target audiences. Clearly more applied knowledge is needed in my written work for my grades to improve, hopefully I will be able to achieve this.

Entry 3 – Understanding the effects of Media on Audiences 11/10/2011

I have learned the 3 main debates concerning the effects of Media on Audiences:

1)      The effects of exposure to explicit sexual or violent content

2)      The effects of advertising

3)      Censorship

These are the predicted results of Media on Audiences:

Direct: Audiences may demonstrate more aggressive behaviour themselves, or they may have more approving attitudes towards the use of violence to resolve conflicts.

Desensitization: The audience becomes so used to explicit material they no longer find it offensive or obscene. They reaction is lessened and this is the reason why movies have gone to greater extremes to provoke a reaction from an audience with films like the Human Centipede and Saw.

Mean World Syndrome: Watching large amounts of violence on TV may lead audiences to belive that the real world contains this amount of pain and violence.

The effects of media are more often assumed to be negative than positive. People who use these theories ignore outside elements such as cultural background, education and upbringing. They rely on the hypodermic Needle Model to argue their debate and ignore the uses and gratifications model. Despite the high number of theories, the relationship between violent media influencing our actions has never been proven completely, media can even have a cathartic effect on audiences.

Entry 2 – Audience Theory 4/10/2011

We have looked at Audience Theories on

http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/documents/short/usegrat.html

I have documented the difference between passive and active consumers and how they are defined through the following theories:

Hypodermic Needle

Uses and Gratification

Reception Theory