Media Effects

Outline:

1. Introduction
2. Agenda Setting 
3. Four Models of Media Effects
A. Direct Effects Model
B. Conditional Model
C. Cumulative Effects Model
D. Cognitive-Transactional Model
1. Introduction
 Media effects theory has been around as long as academic
interest in the mass media. The basic hypothesis is that
because the public access the majority of their information

in a mediated form then the way that that information is
packaged, or mediated, must effect the audience
members’ attitudes and behaviours.
 On this basis various research studies have linked violence
on the screen to violence in society, watching soap operas
and suffering from mental anxiety, as well as negative
reporting of politicians and public cynicism.
 The literature of media effects is frequently characterized as a
three-stage progression initially embracing a theory of strong
effects followed by a repudiation of earlier work and new
model of minimal effects followed by yet another

repudiation and a rediscovery of strong effects.
 The first phase covered the early 20th century through the
1930s. Its focus on media effects was based on the stimulus-
response model drawn from psychology and grounded in
mass society theory drawn from sociology. The “magic
bullet” or “hypodermic needle” model held that the media
were so powerful that the audience was powerless to resist
their influence.
 This model was based on observations that the
technological improvements in public communication and
mass production of popular culture had created a mass
audience attending to the same messages.

 At the same time, sociologists believed that the industrial
revolution had led to a fragmentation of the social bonds in
society, so that people no longer felt part of social
communities but felt isolated and disconnected from others.
 The social and psychological isolation brought on by the
industrial revolution created a mass society in which people
were aimless and disconnected from others. These masses,
then, were especially susceptible to the influence of

powerful, persuasive forces in society, such as mass
communication.
 The second phase of media effects research is often called
the era of limited effects. This phase is marked by regarding
media as having only minimal influence on the audience.


 The reason for media’s limited effects was the power of the
audience to selectively choose and use media content. In
other words, people controlled media and their content
through various selectivity processes: (a) selective

exposure, or control over what they watched, listened to, or
read in the media; (b) selective attention, or control over
which elements of media messages people would pay
attention to; (c) selective perception, or control over how
messages were interpreted; and (d) selective recall, or
control over how and what was learned from the media.
 This phase lasted until the 1960s and led several scholars to
question the value of continuing to study media effects (e.g.,
Berelson, “The State of Communication Research”, 1959).
There seemed to be little justification to studying media

effects, if media’s influence was so minimal. The introduction
and widespread adoption of television, though, brought
scholars to a new phase of effects research.
 McClure and Patterson (1974) noted that television had the
possibility to overcome some selectivity processes. During
elections, political advertisements on television were so
prevalent during prime time that people could not avoid them.

Although people might selectively avoid news programs, it was
much more difficult to avoid political ads interspersed during
entertainment programming. McClure and Patterson found that
people learned about the candidates from the many political
ads on television, even if they weren’t particularly
interested in the election (“Television news and political
advertising: The impact of exposure on voter beliefs”).
2. Agenda Setting
Agenda setting marked the ability of the mass media to tell
people “what to think about.” Gerbner and Gross (1976) found
that the heaviest viewers of television were the most likely to

be “cultivated” by its patterns of images and accept the
television world view as their vision of reality. These heavy
viewers, of course, were relatively unselective in what they
watched on television (“Living with Television: The Violence
Profile”).
 The concept of agenda-setting is founded in the study of the
media, and particularly the press, and is linked to the famous
adage that the media ‘cannot tell you what to think, only what
to think about’ (McCombs and Shaw, 1972).

 The agenda is, at the simplest level, what is the news; at a
more sophisticated level, how that news is reported. A key
function of political communication is to make the public think
about an issue in a way that is favourable to the sender of
the message. This means that every organisation that
desires to influence the public politically must attempt to
control what ideas become dominant in the public sphere.
 Environmentalist groups will try to, firstly, get their stories into
the news and, secondly, control the way they that those
stories are received by media audiences. This may well put
them into conflict with political parties, corporations and other

groups in society; each of whom will wish to set the news
agenda.
 Organizations which aim to strategically set and control the
news agenda will employ communication officers, the spin-
doctors, who will attempt to control the information available
to the media to ensure a negative line cannot be taken.
 The problem with identifying agenda-setting is that it is only
seen by the politician and the journalist, and although we
may find indications in hindsight, or hear accounts of the
practice, it is hard to detect in real time; thus the public are

argued to be susceptible to the subtle controls over the news
they receive (Key Conepts in Political Communication,
Darren Lilleker, 2006).
 However, do we always think about the things that the
media want us to? Borrowing a popular theory from
marketing communications, the Elaboration Likelihood
Model argues that we must be interested in the issue in

order to allow details to enter our subconscious.
 Audience members assess the relevance of a message, be
it mediated or direct from a political party or candidate,
within the subconscious where it is processed; is it
understood or not, and a decision taken whether the
message should be rejected. The change is dependent on
the audience member’s willingness to listen, their ability to
understand and the extent to which it is acceptable to them.
 In contrast, just because we are not interested, or do not see
the relevance in a message, does not mean it is not
remembered.
 Consider , for example, how many advertising slogans that

you can remember despite having never bought the
product or been even remotely interested in that product
category. This is termed ‘low attention processing’, that by
osmosis we absorb heuristics that inform our perspectives
and perceptions of parties, candidates, organisations or
systems.
 One example in this would be the current low opinion of
politicians. Arguably this is fed to media audiences through
a focus on private misdemeanors, particularly sexual
infelicities; abuse of office or the pervasive use of spin to
obfuscate and mislead. 
3. FOUR MODELS OF MEDIA EFFECTS
A) DIRECT EFFECTS
The direct effects model focuses on media content as the most
important explanation for media influence. Effects are seen as

immediate (occurring fairly shortly after exposure), relatively
uniform (similar across all audience members), and consistent
with the goals of the media producer. Moreover, effects within
this model are observable ones (MEDIA EFFECTS AND
SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 The emphasis of this model is on effects that represent
change, not reinforcement. Effects are either behavioral,
cognitive, or affective effects that lead directly to noticeable
actions. For example, the direct effects model is applicable in

understanding how political ads might lead to voting for a
specific candidate (a behavioral effect), or knowledge gain
that would lead to a voting decision (a cognitive effect), or
attitude acquisition that influences voting choice (an affective
effect) (MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M.
Perse).
 The direct effects model ignores the role of the audience in
the media effects process. People are assumed to be
incapable of countering media’s impact. They may lack the
mental capacity to analyze media messages. So young

children may be the targets of direct effects. Or people may
have little background knowledge or context about certain
events and issues and be reliant solely on media content. In
these situations, effects maybe direct (MEDIA EFFECTS
AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
B) CONDITIONAL EFFECTS
This model is drawn from the limited effects model described
by the received view. Like the limited effects model, the
conditional model places emphasis on the audience and is

based on notions of selectivity (selective exposure, attention,
perception, and recall) and social influence. The limited effects
model downplays the possibility of most media effects beyond
reinforcement, whereas the conditional model recognizes that
media effects can occur and offers explanations for those
effects (MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 This model is called the conditional model because media
effects are conditional on the audience member. This model
recognizes that all media exposure is not bound to result in
media effects. The audience has the power to avoid exposure

and reject influence. And, when media effects occur, they are
certainly not uniform. Different people may be affected quite
differently by the same media content (MEDIA EFFECTS
AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 To give a simple example: Certainly not everyone is going to
cry at the end of a sad movie. Some may never watch the
movie because they dislike the actors or the story device.
Even some of those who watch the movie will dislike it, and

some may go to a movie they don’t expect to like, just to
accompany someone. And even those who like the movie
may not cry. Different people have different feelings about
expressing emotions in public places. Still others may be
profoundly affected by the movie and find themselves
sobbing at certain scenes. So, the conditional model holds
that the explanation of the effects of the movie rests with the
individual audience member (MEDIA EFFECTS AND
SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 The conditional model, because it focuses mainly on the
individual audience member, can be used to explain almost
any media effect at an individual level.
 The individual is the focus of media effects because of the

individual’s power to be selective. The audience member is
central to the conditional model (and media content is
ignored, for the most part) because of selectivity processes
that act as barriers to intended media effects (MEDIA
EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 This model is called conditional because when effects do
occur, they are conditional on some attribute of the
audience. For example:
Learning from the news might be conditional on the reasons

the viewer is watching. Or cultivation effects from watching
prime-time television might be conditional on whether the
viewer has had personal experience with crime. Or, the
effects of political messages about changes in Medicare
funding might be conditional on the age of the audience
member (MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M.
Perse)
C) CUMULATIVE EFFECTS
The cumulative effects model is drawn from the “return to
powerful effects” era of the received view of media effects
history. The main emphasis of this model is the ubiquitous

nature of certain media content that overrides any potential of
the audience to limit exposure to certain messages. This model
focuses on the consonance and repetition of themes and
messages across media content (MEDIA EFFECTS AND
SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 The explanation for media effects, then, rests in media
content—its consistent make-up and depiction. The
audience is not relevant to this model because it is not within
their power to avoid certain media messages (MEDIA

EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 Unlike the direct effects model, this model explains that
media effects are a result of cumulative exposure, not due
to a single event. Through repeated exposure to similar
content across channels, people are moved. The effects of

this model are generally reality-construction effects. That is,
through cumulative exposure, people begin to adopt the
media’s framing as their own representation of reality
(MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 Effects, according to the cumulative model, are limited to
cognitions (belief and attitude acquisition) and affect
(emotional reactions). This model, then, focuses on more
subtle effects. Although behaviors may be linked to

how people think and feel, behaviors are not seen as a direct
results of media exposure. Effects are assumed to be fairly
enduring because media content tends to be fairly consistent
across time. If content changes, then effects might diminish.
(MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse)
 Agenda setting can be viewed as a cumulative effect.
Agenda setting is conceptualized as the power of the news
media to direct our concerns toward certain issues. The
effect is a fairly limited cognitive one: the news media don’t

tell us what to think, but what to think about (MEDIA
EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 Agenda setting is based on observations that news content
tends to be fairly consonant across news channels.
Broadcasting, cable, and print news media highlight the
same types of stories, issues, events, and people (MEDIA

EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M. Perse).
 Through repeated, heavy exposure to television, viewers
begin to believe that the real world is similar to the television
world. The most researched area of cultivation effects is that
of fear of crime. Heavy television viewers become more

fearful. The cultivation effect, is both cognitive (developing a
world view based on television content) and affects
(fear) (MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M.
Perse).
 Cultivation is based on the results of content analyses that
reveal that violence of some kind and patterns of group
victimization cut across all prime-time television content.
Because most people watch television during those hours,

they see those patterns of violence and images; selective
exposure is not relevant (MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY,
Elizabeth M. Perse).
D) COGNITIVE-TRANSACTIONAL MODEL
This model is drawn from cognitive psychology. It applies the
notion of schematic processing to the media context. Several
theorists have explained that how humans mentally process

environmental stimuli affects how we interpret and learn new
information (MEDIA EFFECTS AND SOCIETY, Elizabeth M.
Perse).
 The key to this model is the schema. Knowledge, according
to this approach, does not exist as isolated chunks in our
brains. Instead, all knowledge is organized into schemas.
 Schemata are mental structures that an individual uses to

organize knowledge and guide cognitive processes and
behaviour. People use schemata (the plural of schema) to
categorize objects and events based on common elements
and characteristics and thus interpret and predict the world.
New information is processed according to how it fits into
these mental structures, or rules.
 Schemata represent the ways in which the characteristics
of certain events or objects are recalled, as determined by
one’s self-knowledge and cultural-political background.
Examples of schemata include rubrics, perceived social

roles, stereotypes, and worldviews.
 The concept of schema was first introduced into psychology
by British psychologist Frederic Bartlett in Remembering: A
Study in Experimental and Social Psychology (1932).
Bartlett perceived organized knowledge as an elaborate

network of abstract mental structures that represent a
person’s understanding of the world, and he studied the
impact of one’s cultural background in rephrasing and
memorizing certain events.
 Schemas exist for all domains: (a) role schemas (e.g.,
what a college professor is like), (b) person schemas
(our understanding of others we know), (c) self-schemas
(how we think about ourselves), (d) group schemas

(e.g., males vs. females), and (e) event schemas (e.g.,
scripts). All these are mental representations of our
knowledge about various people, events, and issues.
 It is clear that schemas are also relevant in the mass
communication context. We not only apply our schemas to
interpreting mass media content (e.g., group schema and
how women on television ought to act or person schema to

help us anticipate how a favorite talk show host will deal
with guests), but we also have schemas that help us
understand mass media content specifically. We know, for
example, that when we see a teen-age girl begin to undress
in an empty house in a horror film, mayhem is almost sure
to follow.
 Schemas not only organize knowledge, but they serve
several other functions that influence media effects. First,
they direct selective exposure, perception, attention, and
recall. The schema that is in use directs attention to certain

aspects of the environment that are relevant to that schema.
Second, because they organize knowledge, schemas control
how new information is integrated with prior knowledge. How
a news story is framed (with headlines, graphics, or
introduction) influences which schema is used to interpret the
information and which schema any new knowledge is
associated with.
 Third, schemas allow people to make inferences about new
situations and help reduce uncertainty about what to think
or how to act. When we attend the first class in a semester,
for example, we have a fairly good idea of what will happen

during that meeting, even if we’ve never been in one of
that professor’s classes. Fourth, schemas allow us to go
beyond the stimuli and make inferences about things that
are not shown. Most soap opera viewers, for example, know
what is happening in the “fade to black” that ends a
romantic sex scene.
 There are two ways that schemas operate: through
controlled or through automatic processing (Bargh,1988).
Controlled processing is individual-controlled mental activity.
It usually involves goal-directed, thoughtful mental action.

When students are studying for a test, for example, they
very consciously look for links among the course concepts
and try to connect class readings with lecture materials. Or,
when well-educated, politically involved people read the
newspaper, they may concentrate and try to integrate the
new material with prior beliefs about political issues.
 In controlled processing, the individual chooses and self-
activates the schema that they believe is relevant to
the task. In a sense, controlled processing involves a good
deal of selectivity. When one is goal-directed, he or she may

focus only on those media messages that have relevance for
the task.
 Much media use, however, is not controlled. People are
often more automatic in their approach to mass media
consumption. Much television viewing grows out of
entertainment or relaxation motives, for example, that leads

viewers to be more automatic in their viewing. When people
are relaxed or distracted, they may react more automatically
to the environment.
 Automatic processing is an effortless, low-mental processing
of environmental stimuli. In this case, environmental stimuli
(media content) may prime or activate schemas. When a
schema is primed, it is, in a sense, energized and moves to

the top of the mind. As long as it is top of mind, that schema
will be used to interpret stimuli; that schema will influence
selective exposure, attention, perception, and recall.
 Priming is an unconscious, relatively short-term effect; a
schema rarely is top of mind for more than a few hours. But,
once a schema has been primed, it retains some of its
energy, and is more easy to bring to top of mind again. One

way to think about priming is to think about a filing system.
When a schema is primed, it is pulled from the mental files.
As other schemas subsequently primed, that first schema
gets “buried.” But, it is easy to find and reactivate if few other
schemas have been used.