Audience Theories

Theories are used in the media industry to suggest how the audience consume media products such as film in a mental way.

The hypodermic needle theory

This theory was first brought up in the 1920's and was the first attempt to explain how mass audiences might react to mass media. It is a weird theory and suggests that audiences passively receive the information transmitted via a media text, without any attempt on their part to process or challenge the data.

Basically, the Hypodermic Needle Theory suggests that the information from a text passes into the mass consciousness of the audience unmediated, I.e the experience, intelligence and opinion of an individual are not relevant to the reception of the text. This theory suggests that, as an audience, we are manipulated by the creators of media texts, and that our behavior and thinking might be easily changed by media-makers. It assumes that the audience are passive and heterogeneous. This theory is still quoted during moral panics by parents, politicians and pressure groups, and is used to explain why certain groups in society should not be exposed to certain media texts, for fear that they will watch or read sexual or violent behavior and will then act them out themselves.

The biggest example of the application of the Hypodermic Needle Theory was illustrated on October 30, 1938, On the eve of Halloween, radio programming was interrupted with a "news bulletin" for the first time. What the audience heard was that Martians had begun an invasion of Earth in a place called Grover's Mill, New Jersey.

It became known as the "Panic Broadcast" and changed broadcast history. Approximately 12 million people in the United States heard the broadcast and about one million of those actually believed that a serious alien invasion was underway. A wave of mass hysteria disrupted households, interrupted religious services, caused traffic jams and clogged communication systems. People fled their city homes to seek shelter in more rural areas, raided grocery stores and began to ration food. The nation was in a state of chaos, and this broadcast was the cause of it.

Uses and Gratifications Theory

This theory suggests that the audience is an active audience and not a passive one. The theory suggests the audience chose what media to listen to or consume; the media doesn't control the audience the audience controls the media.

For example using some social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter is an active choice for the audience and they choose if they want to consume the information or not. This can also be said for newspapers, the audience chooses to consume what they want to.

 

Reception Theory

This theory suggests that the audience doesn't passively consume the media and makes interpretations due to the upbringing, social status, culture and life experiences of the individual.

This work was based on Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding model of the relationship between text and audience - the text is encoded by the producer, and decoded by the reader, and there may be major differences between two different readings of the same code. However, by using recognised codes and conventions, and by drawing upon audience expectations relating to aspects such as genre and use of stars, the producers can position the audience and thus create a certain amount of agreement on what the code means. This is known as a preferred reading.

In my film opening I think I will take into consideration all of the theories and try and apply the one that fits best. I think that the one that would fit best would be the hypodermic needle theory as we are a mainstream company aiming at a passive audience.