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    Iqra Gohar
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    There are four main eras of media theory: 1) The mass society era saw media as negatively influential on average people and gave rise to propaganda and magic bullet theories. 2) The scientific era emphasized empirical research showing media's effects were more limited and people could resist influence. 3) Limited effects theory dominated in the 1960s and some thought the field was "dead", though student interest grew. 4) Cultural criticism emerged in Britain and looked at how media promote dominant cultures and elites maintain power.

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    There are four main eras of media theory: 1) The mass society era saw media as negatively influential on average people and gave rise to propaganda and magic bullet theories. 2) The scientific era emphasized empirical research showing media's effects were more limited and people could resist influence. 3) Limited effects theory dominated in the 1960s and some thought the field was "dead", though student interest grew. 4) Cultural criticism emerged in Britain and looked at how media promote dominant cultures and elites maintain power.

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    397 views2 pages

    Era's of Media Theory

    Uploaded by

    Iqra Gohar
    There are four main eras of media theory: 1) The mass society era saw media as negatively influential on average people and gave rise to propaganda and magic bullet theories. 2) The scientific era emphasized empirical research showing media's effects were more limited and people could resist influence. 3) Limited effects theory dominated in the 1960s and some thought the field was "dead", though student interest grew. 4) Cultural criticism emerged in Britain and looked at how media promote dominant cultures and elites maintain power.

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    Eras of Media Theory

    There are four main eras of media theory. The four eras are mass society and mass culture,
    scientific perspective, limited effects and cultural criticism. Theories are constructed within
    media technology eras. These theories came about due to changes in society and politics.
    Era of Mass Society and Mass Culture:
    This era of theory started in the latter half of the 19th century. Media was seen as influential but
    negative. This era is characterized as a time in which people were worried about the power that
    media had to influence average people. People feared that media would ruin the value of society.
    Theories that came about during this time are the propaganda theory and magic bullet theory.
    Era of Scientific Perspective:
    This era of theory is characterized by Paul Lazarfield escaping Germany to go to the United
    States during the time of Nazism and Hitler. The era emphasized the use of scientific research
    and experiments that are carefully conducted in order to prove that media was not as powerful as
    thought in the previous eras. This era emphasized that people can resist media influence in
    multiple ways. The limited-effects theory was born in the era of scientific perspective.
    Starting in 1940s, especially by Paul Lazarsfeld who fled from Nazi Germany to the US. The use
    of scientific approach, carefully designed field experiment and measurement, to observe media
    influence on society. “Media were not as powerful as previously imagined” Thus, the effect of
    media towards the audience is limited. “People had numerous ways of resisting media influence
    and were influenced by many competing factors”. “Media seemed to reinforce existing social
    trends and strenghthen rather that threaten the status quo”. We will discuss the studies by
    Lazarsfeld, Hovland, etc.
    Era of Limited Effects Theory:
    By the mid-1960, the debate between mass society and limited effects was over, in which the
    latter gained more support. The empirical research findings confirmed the latter view. Since no
    “big problem” in media, Berelson (1959) declared the field communication research to be dead.
    During the 1960s and into the 1970s, the limited effects paradigm dominated American mass
    communication research. We will discuss: information flow theory, diffusion theory,
    phenomenistic theory, etc.
    The limited effects era came about in the 1960s. Limited effects theory was widely supported
    over mass society theory. At this point, researchers thought there was nothing more to research.
    Some considered the mass communications field to be dead. However, the communications
    discipline grew because students started attending journalism schools in numbers never seen
    before. Elite pluralism and social cognitive theory are notable theories from this era. 
    Era of Cultural Criticism:
    The era of cultural criticism is characterized by the creation of cultural studies in Britain. British
    cultural studies focused on how mass media promote hegemonic cultures. Hegemonic cultures
    are cultures that are forced from the outside onto people and it only serves people in elite
    positions. It looked at how powerful elites retain power. Culture is the behavior that members of
    a group learn. Social scientists became increasingly interested in culture theories during the
    1950s and 1960s. Theories of culture intended to provide explanation on how the media changes
    culture and the consequences that result. An example of a cultural theory is the political
    economy theory. The political economy theory is a macroscopic theory of culture because it is
    concerned about society as a whole and not just individuals. Microscopic theories focus their
    attention on individuals and not society. The political economy theory studies the powers that
    power elites have over the institutions that run countries. A bank is an example of such
    institution Exercises.
    Mass society notions continued to flourish in Europe. Both left-wing and right-wing concerns
    about the power of media, learning from the trauma of the WW II. During the 1960s, neomarxist
    in Britain developed a school of social theory widely referred to as British cultural studies.
    Neomarxist: Social theorists asserting that media enable dominant social elites to maintain
    power. In North America, there was an attempt to create an “American culture studies” (Innis
    and McLuhan, for example).
    The Emergence of Moderate Effects:
    The limited effects paradigm have undergone a transformation, due to the pressure of cultural
    studies and new communication technology. The idea of active audience that uses media content
    to create meaningful experience. Acknowledges that media effects can occur over longer period
    of time (while limited effect was unable to understand the media role in cultural changes).

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