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COM 275 EXAM 1

Terms in this set (75)

Which of the following types of communication is least likely to involve mutual interaction?
A) interpersonal communication
B) media communication
C) mass communication
D) All three are likely to involve mutual interaction.
E) None of these are likely to involve mutual interaction
C - Mass communication
Nick wants to study the effect of violent media on children. To do this, he designs an experiment in which children are randomly assigned to two either view a violent movie or a non-violent movie, and then Nick measures the children's aggressive behaviors. What method of research is this?
A) Content analysis
B) Experiment
C) Survey
D) Meta-analysis
E) Triangulation
B - Experiment
A model of communication based on principles of stimulus-response psychology is which kind of model?
A) linear
B) interactive
C) transactional
D) false
E) reciprocal
A - Linear
All of the following are positive reasons to use experiments except:
A) They are good for establishing causality
B) They are relatively inexpensive
C) They give the researcher a lot of control
D) They allow us to make decisions about what "ought" to be
E) They allow observation of people in natural settings
E - They allow observation of people in natural settings
The Payne Fund Studies focused on which of the following:
A) the impact of widespread television adoption
B) the impact of violent and sexually explicit film on children
C) the impact of war propaganda in the U.S. and Europe
D) the impact of comic book readership among children
E) the impact of socialism on children's media usage
B - the impact of violent and sexually explicit film on children
President Woodrow Wilson established this agency during World War I to engage in propaganda and censorship activities:
A) Office of Technology Assessment
B) Central Intelligence Agency
C) Committee on Public Information
D) National Security Agency
E) Federal Radio Commission
C - Committee on Public Information
All of the following characterized 1920's Mass Society except:
A) Interpersonal communication became more difficult
B) Media became important information sources
C) Trust became increasing important to social structure
D) Social differentiation increased
E) People had less-strong interpersonal ties to one another
C - Trust became increasing important to social structure
You were listening to the Mercury Broadcasting Company's rendition of War of theWorlds on Oct. 20, 1938. Unlike your neighbors, you knew the broadcast was purelyfor entertainment. Of the options below, all are reasons why you were not afraid except which one?
A) You tuned into the radio broadcast at the beginning and hear the disclaimer
B) You heard several inconsistencies in the broadcast and, thus, didn't trust it.
C) You lived in Downer's Grove, New Jersey and were not aware of any commotion.
D) Your radio, like most radios of the day, often malfunctioned and was not working that night; thus, you never heard the broadcast.
E) You were skeptical of the radio broadcast, and checked the reports with other media outlets. Thus, you discovered that since no other news outlets were covering the "invasion" it must have been a hoax.
D - Your radio, like most radios of the day, often malfunctioned and was not working that night; thus, you never heard the broadcast.
Which author became famous for his five question model of media effects:
A) Harold Lasswell
B) Walter Lippmann
C) Paul Lazarsfeld
D) Joseph Klapper
E) Samuel Stouffer
A - Harold Lasswell
Which of the following is not one of the questions in Lasswell's five question model of communication?
A) Who?
B) Says what?
C) When?
D) To whom?
E) Through what channel?
C - when?
According to Lazarsfeld, opinion leaders receive information from the media and then pass it along to many others (i.e., many people thus learn indirectly from the media). This is known as what?
A) Opinion leadership model
B) Two step flow model
C) Interactive model
D) Transactional model
E) Media flow theory
B - Two step flow model
Which theory of media-society relations claims that the media creates a false consciousness among the working class?
A) Functionalism
B) Mass Society theory
C) Modernization and Development theory
D) Marxist Theory
E) Democracy
D - Marxist Theory
Which part of the culture-society relations typology would say that society has a big impact on culture, but culture does not impact society?
A) materialism
B) idealism
C) interdependence
D) autonomy
E) regulation
A - materialism
The "Fourth Estate" refers to the notion that?
A) The media is a public trust and should be free but self-regulated.
B) The media should be heavily regulated by the government.
C) The media should be owned by the elite of society.
D) Media access should be free and available for all citizens.
E) Media are property owners just like individuals
A - The media is a public trust and should be free but self-regulated.
As a cultural theorist, you are concerned with the portrayal of homosexual men on network television. Specifically, you are concerned that the stereotype of the "effeminate gay man" that is glorified in shows like Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and Will and Grace is an unfair, negative representation of homosexual men. What is your specific concern?
A) As people lose their individual cultures, mass society is ignoring gay men.
B) Not all homosexual men are "prissy" and you worry that this representation is an unfair, negative stereotype of homosexuality as a subculture.
C) You're worried that newer cable technologies are not as accessible to homosexuals as they are to other parts of the population.
D) You're concerned that advertisers are unfairly marketing their shows in order to appeal to a homosexual base that may have more expendable income.
E) None of the above.
B - Not all homosexual men are "prissy" and you worry that this representation is an unfair, negative stereotype of homosexuality as a subculture.
Which dichotomy is NOT one of the conflicting influences on organizations and individuals?
A) Commerce vs. art.
B) Liberal vs. conservative.
C) Constraint vs. autonomy.
D) Profit vs. social purpose.
E) Routine production vs. creativity
B - Liberal vs. conservative.
Ex-President Bill Clinton has just donated $3 billion to a world-wide initiative to curb global warming. Rupert Murdoch, the head of Fox News and an ardent opponent of Clinton and his green policies, does not want his news organization to cover the event. How would he flex his influence and promote his personal agenda?
A) At the editorial meeting, Murdoch "called out" his editors, telling them that "this Clinton this is just a press party" and not to glorify it with a newsstory.
B) As a content editor, Murdoch simply buries the story, placing it in the "notfit for print" pile of his desk.
C) In the company's pre-existing editorial guidelines, the policy is "let the rain forest burn" and, thus, the story is bumped for coverage of a car bombing in Kabul.
D) Murdoch doesn't really have much influence in the situation, and coverageof the event is up to his editorial staff.
E) None of the above
C - In the company's pre-existing editorial guidelines, the policy is "let the rain forest burn" and, thus, the story is bumped for coverage of a car bombing in Kabul.
The goal of the behavioral tradition in audience research is:
A) To obtain reliable estimates of size
B) Finding media effects and media uses
C) Concern with popular culture
D) Identifying reflections of particular social-culture
E) None of the above
B - Finding media effects and media uses
Which of the following is one of the six concepts of audience research when discussing how big of an audience does the message reach?
A) Internal Audience
B) Children's Audience
C) Prime Time Audience
D) External Audience
E) Attentive Audience
E - Attentive Audience
What are the five media-organizational relations that organizations have with outside forces?
Society, pressure groups, owners, clients and suppliers, audience, internal to the organization
How do structural features and organizational routines/practices affect media content?
structural feature (size, ownership, function) influence organization conduct performance and product
What are the conflicting influences on organizations and individuals?
constraint vs autonomy, commerce vs art, profit vs social purpose, routine production vs creativity
What is traditional content analysis?
- link between the external object and reference will be clear
-frequency of occurrence will express meaning
-risk of imposing an incorrect meaning-system
What are the different critical perspectives of media content? What are their characteristic differences?
-Critical analysis of media, ability to fulfill intended functions, domination of media establishment
-Marxist approaches - media contain images favorable to ruling class. Audiences uncritically consume these images and adopt this favorable view
What is structuralism? What are its characteristic features?
Explores the nature of sign systems that regulate the latent meaning of texts.
goals is to identify the cultural meaning of media content
What is information theory?
Communication is the intentional transfer of information
Content should be judged by its efficiency in reducing uncertainty
Informative text, pictures, and narratives can be quantified to judge effectiveness
How is quality evaluated in research using a "media performance discourse" approach?
Quality of information is measurable. Usually based on some notion of public interest such as: freedom and independence, content diversity, news objectivity, reality reflection or distortion
What are the strengths and weaknesses of traditional content analysis vs. the alternative (i.e. interpretive) methods of research?
strength - links between external object and reference will be clear. Frequency of occurrence will express 'meaning'
Weakness - Risk of imposing an incorrect meaning system
What are some of the characteristics of the modern mass media audience?
It is larger, more diverse locations, and it is individualized and privatized
What are the four main types of audiences?
-audience as a group or public
-gratification set as audience
-the medium audience
-audience as defined by content
What are the six major concepts of reach
-The Available (or potential) audience
-The paying audience
-The attentive audience
-The internal audience
-The cumulative audience
-The target audience
What media audience model is associated with Clausse?
5 layer model
Layers: internalized, registered, received, receivable, offered
What are Biocca's different definitions of "activity"?
Selectivity: planned use prior to exposure
Utilitarianism: conscious need satisfaction
Intentionality: active processing during use
Resistance to influence: resistance during processing
Involvement: caught up in experience during use
What is a model, and what are the differences between linear, interactive and transactional models?
A model is a graphic means of explicating an abstract process such as communication
Linear - based on principles of stimulus - response psychology
Interactive - circular model in which communication is shown to be interactive and interpretive
Transactional - describes the giving and receiving of information through communication
What is Lasswell's five-factor model of communication?
Who, says what, in which channel, to whom, with what affect?
What is Meta-Analysis and Triangulation
Meta-Analysis - conducted to assess the strength of evidence present to find common results
Triangulation - a form of manipulation which describes a person use of threats of exclusion or manipulation
What defines mass communication?
Large scale distribution and reception process characterizes by:
• One directional information flow
• Impersonal source and anonymous receiver
• Asymmetrical source-receiver association (organized powerful source)
• Market (i.e., economic) exchange relationship
• Standardized message content
What were the trends leading to modern society?
industrialization, urbanization, modernization
What characterized 1920's mass society?
The roaring twenties
-Social differentiation increases
-Informal social controls weaken
-communication becomes more difficult
-Media becomes more important
What is the magic bullet theory?
-It is the discredited theory that media effects are so powerful that the audience is defenseless.
-People are socially isolated
-Not influenced by social ties
What characterizes the Payne Fund Studies? What can be said about them today?
a series of studies conducted to determine the effects of movies on the behavior of children and adolescents
studies do not really show uniform effects, is also interpreted as evidence of magic bullet
Why was the "War of the Worlds" important
helped to shape the entire sci-fi genre
Understand perspectives of 19th Century Beginnings
o Powerful Media Effects
o Limited Media Effects
o Effects of Varying Levels
- Powerful media effects--early scientists assumed powerful effects early books advocate powerful effects - Limited media effects- - focus shifts to individuals post depression voluntary in groups limited impact of media - Effects of varying levels -Individual differences and environments are important moderators of media effects - strong or week effect may occur under different context - individual differences and environments are important moderators of media effects
Carl Hovland
- experimental research about media effects on attitude change, why we fight
- First experiments in mass communication
Paul Lazarsfeld
- Effects of radio
- "Opinion leader"
- Two step flow model of media effect
Harold Lasswell
-3 important media functions
- 5 question model
- Who, what, which, whom, what
Kurt Lewin
dynamics of group communication, Sweetbreads study
Samuel Stouffer's Research
pioneered imperial research & statistical methods for media research
Douglas Waples
Added under what conditions to the 5 questions
Wilbur Schramm
mediating factors (what comes between content and audience effect) selective exposure, selective perception, selective retention, and social categories perspectives
Bernard Berelson
-five variables in generalization
-there is evidence that:
-some communication
-on some issues
-on some people
-under some conditions
-have some effects
Joseph Klapper
Media are not a necessary or sufficient cause of change.
Typically mediating factors make media and agent of reinforcement
Albert Bandura
researcher famous for work in observational or social learning including the famous Bobo doll experiment
There are four typologies of culture-society relations. What are they?
-Clan culture
- Hierarchical culture
- Market culture
-Adhocracy culture
What is meant by the term mediation?
media's role in providing knowledge
- Mediation creates relationships with objects not directly known
- provide versions of events not directly experienced, creates "contact" with actors, politicians, and others not otherwise accessible,
-cultivates particular perceptions of people, places, and events
What are the types of theories of media-society relations?
- Macro theory- dealing with the media as part of the larger social setting -
Media institution theories- focusing on the workings of the media as organizations -
Audience theories- concerned with audience uses of media
- Mainly concerned with power, social, integration and social change
- Values will influence the perception of these categorie
Anomie
normalness
mass society
- Media controlled by dominant elite
- corresponds to the dominance model of media power
Marxist
Media creates a false consciousness that subordinates the working class
Functionalism
media are a functional part of society that contributes by promoting order, transmitting culture, and reducing tension
Critical Political-Economic
media economics and technology concentrate ownership, resulting in commodification and subordinating public interest to private interests
modernization and development
-Media can promote modernization and development- particularly in developing world
- Media can disseminate- skills and technical known-how, progressive work ethics, democracy
Communication Technology determinism
social change result from biases that are inherent in the form of new media technology
information society
new media technology promote social change characterized by an economy based on information society
What are the major perspectives of mass communication research
-social scientific
- culturalist: focuses on construction of meaning from texts
What are commodification, commercialization and hegemony? How are they related? How are they distinct?
all economic issues
-Commodification is the transformation of goods and services, as well as ideas or other entities that normally may not be considered goods, into a commodity (in the Marxist sense of the word). The Marxist understanding of commodity is distinct from the meaning of commodity in mainstream business theory.
-Commercialization or Commercialisation is the process or cycle of introducing a new product or production method into the market. Many technologies begin in the laboratory and are not practical for commercial use in their infancy.
- Hegemony- leadership or dominance, especially by one country or social group over others.
What 4 areas of concerns do cultural theorists deal with
- The notion of a mass culture
- Questions of gender and subculture
- The role of new technology
- Political- economic issues : commodification, commercialization, hegemony
What is characteristic of normative theory?
- Value judgments concerning how media ought to operate
- Early scholars focused mostly on informational media
What are the five categories central to the media-society debate?
- Ownership: should be plurality
- Order: should assist in maintenance
- Expectations: should be fair, accurate and complete
- Values: should support dominate values of society
- Rights: should respect the rights of individuals
What is the fourth estate?
- based on a theory of the free press
- theory of social responsibility: ownership of media is a public trust, press must be truthful, accurate, and objective, press should be free but self-regulated
-Press influence: authoritarian soviet communist, libertarian, social responsibility
Laboratory experiments pros and cons
pros- good for establishing causality. research has a lot of control. relatively inexpensive
Cons- artificial surroundings may affect a participants behavior. experimental bias
Technology and culture
-media logic
-cultivation
-global culture
-postmodern culture
3. Hypothesis influenced by
- media workers socialization & attitudes
-media organization routines
-social institutions and forces
Interpretive approaches
attributes
- no quantification
- attention to latent content
- assume source assign many meanings
limits
- no commonly accepted systematic method
- does not meet scientific standards of reliability
- not easy to generalize
- not a way of summarizing content
survey research
pros- participants are observed in natural settings. Behaviors are more natural
Cons- little or no evidence of casual relationships. poor quality of self-report data
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