The terms “pseudo-event” and “media event” refer to the phenomenon that in modern societies many events are created with the sole aim of getting media coverage, or rather that events are staged in a way that lends itself to media coverage. Boorstin (1961) created the term “pseudo-event”. He sees pseudo-events as “synthetic news.” They do
Altheide and Snow (1979) were the first to use the term “media logic” to identify the specific frame of reference of the production of media culture in general and of the news in particular. They define media logic as a way of seeing and interpreting social affairs. Elements of this form of communication include the
Political advocacy is not journalists’ main concern. They are chiefly in the business of gathering and disseminating the daily news, and they define themselves more by their professionalism than by their partisanship. According to McQuail (1994, 145), “The height of [journalists’] professional skill is the exercise of a practical craft, which delivers the required institutional
The term “media democracy” insinuates that the media and mediated communication are of central relevance for modern democracies due to their decisive influence on (or consequences for) political institutions (macro level) and political actors (meso level) as well as individual citizens (micro level). Theoretically associated with the media democracy concept is the notion of a
Media diplomacy has become a major instrument of foreign policy, and journalists are more frequently and more intensively engaged in diplomatic events and processes. Sometimes they even initiate diplomatic processes. There are several ways in which the media can help or hinder diplomacy. The media functions both as an independent actor and as a tool
The mass media can play a significant role in shaping the social attitudes and social behaviors of children and adolescents. These effects are distinct from more general media effects that do not involve attitudes toward or behaviors with others, such as purchasing behaviors or learning educational content. Although parents exert the most influence on children
Stereotypes are positive or negative generalizations indiscriminately attributed to members of a group (Tamborini et al. 2000). They have a significant impact on individuals’ perception of and interactions with members of different social groups by conveying information about the social groups’ capabilities (e.g., fast learners, good athletes), personalities (e.g., shy, violent) and/or socio-economic status (e.g.
Humans act, at least partly, on the basis of how they think others expect them to act. This means that humans have the capacity to know what others think or expect them to do. Some researchers have argued that understanding what others think is essential to social life and that successful human relationships depend on
In The people’s choice, Paul F. Lazarsfeld and his colleagues laid out many of the key issues that disciplines such as communication, political science, and sociology continue to struggle with when modeling the intersection of mass media and social networks (Lazarsfeld et al. 1948). More specifically, they offered two key constructs to explain the interplay
Media use is a central leisure-time activity for many families worldwide. Given the considerable time investment of family members in media use collectively and individually, and the fact that the family is the context in which young people are first exposed to media, it is important to study how family dynamics shape the use of
Communication scholars, psychologists, sociologists, and other social scientists have long been interested in how individuals interpret the real world around them. Although some of the information we receive in our daily lives is first-hand, much of what we know about our communities, states, countries, and the world comes to us through second-hand sources. Perceptions of
The media landscape of West Asia includes countries and media systems as diverse as Turkey, with big media conglomerate holdings; Lebanon, whose media strongly influence developments in the Arab media sector, state-controlled Syrian media, partly controlled media under the Palestinian National Authority (PNA); and pro-government media in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. The media market
Visual portrayals of women in the media tend to emphasize idealized standards of thinness and beauty that are beyond the reach of most women. The systematic analysis of the body type of fashion models (Silverstein et al. 1986) provide convincing evidence that women portrayed in glamorous roles in the popular media are thinner than the
The Russian Federation is a 17.1 million km2 territory, on which a population of 146 million is unevenly distributed. It has borders with 14 countries in Europe and Asia. Russia is a federal republic comprised of 88 federal administrative units subordinate to the central government. Russia is divided into seven federal regions headed by plenipotentiaries
Singapore, an island nation at the southern tip of mainland Southeast Asia, has a population of about 3.6 million made up of 77 percent Chinese, 14 percent Malays, 7 percent Indians, and 2 percent classified as others. A former British colony, the republic adopts the Westminster parliamentary system, and the government has been controlled by
Spain had in 2005 a population of 44.1 million inhabitants and was twelfth in world ranking in GDP. Just after Greece and Portugal, it became the third Mediterranean country in Europe to re-establish a democratic system in the early 1970s. The new regime after the death of the dictator General Francisco Franco in 1975 brought
Switzerland is a small, federal, non-EU-member country in the center of Europe. It has a population of 7.4 million people, about 21 percent of whom are foreigners, and four official languages, namely German (the first language of 64 percent of the population), French (20 percent), Italian (6.5 percent), and Romansh (0.5 percent). The media inflow
The Islamic Republic of Iran (population approx. 67,500,000 in 2004; adult literacy rate 77.1 percent) was established as a result of Iran’s revolution in 1979. The political system blends republican elements (i.e., regular parliamentary and presidential elections) with the idea of the “government of the Islamic jurist” (velayate faqih), developed during the 1960s and 1970s
Israel, a young democracy, established in 1948, with a 120-member unicameral parliament elected officially every four years in universal, proportional, nationwide elections, is located in the Middle East, along the eastern coastline of the Mediterranean Sea, bordered by Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Egypt. It lies at the junction of three continents: Europe, Asia, and Africa.
Italy (population 58.4 million) is one of the founding members of the EU. It is a parliamentary republic; general elections are held every five years. The electoral system, formerly a mix of majoritarian rule and proportional representation, was changed to purely proportional before the general election of 2006. Governments and political parties have always displayed
Japan is an advanced industrialized country whose GNP/GDP is the second largest in the world. Its population is 127 million, which is the ninth largest in the world. The political system is a parliamentary democracy with the emperor as the state figurehead. The literacy rate is nearly 100 percent, and the per-capita income is about
Malaysia is a federation of 13 states covering an area of 329,750 square km. A parliamentary democracy with a constitutional monarchy, Malaysia shares a border in common with five of the 10 ASEAN countries, namely Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Brunei Darussalam, and the Philippines. It has a population of 26.6 million, comprising the three major ethnic
Mexico gained its independence from Spain in 1810, and in 1822 it became a republic. Of the history prior to the 1910 revolution, the war between Mexico and the United States in the mid-nineteenth century needs to be mentioned, in which the former lost almost half of its territory – this became a permanent source
Despite its open borders and its central location between big European countries, the Netherlands (with a population of 16.3 million) has its own tradition with respect to both press and broadcasting, a tradition that is closely related to the country’s overall sociopolitical structure during most of the twentieth century. In the early years of the
The Republic of Poland is one of the largest countries in central Europe, and in size of population (38.7 million people) ranks eighth in Europe. Of that population, 98 percent are of Polish ethnic origin, and over 90 percent are Roman Catholics. Politics in Poland takes place in the framework of a parliamentary representative democratic
Situated in southwestern Europe, Portugal covers an area of 92,152 sq km and has a population of 10.6 million (2006 estimate). The two biggest cities are Lisbon, the capital, and Oporto. The official language is Portuguese. The literacy rate is 93 percent, and 94 percent of the population are Roman Catholic. In 2005, the country’s
For centuries, China stood as a leading civilization, outpacing the rest of the world in the arts and sciences. But in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, China was beset by civil unrest, major famines, military defeats, and foreign occupation. After World War II, the Communists, under chairman Mao Zedong, founded the People’s Republic of
With an area of 1.14 million square kilometers, Colombia is the fourth largest country in Latin America. The population is 45 million. Geographical conditions impede the infrastructural development as well as the opening up of an efficient system of communication. For several decades, a violent conflict has been going on in Colombia. As a consequence
A system is an assemblage of individual elements that together constitute a whole, with each component interacting with the others and with the outer world. Using this approach, a media system may be seen as consisting of different publishing entities, such as news agencies, the press, or television, which relate to each other. To give
With nearly 111,000 square kilometers Cuba is the largest island in the Caribbean Sea. It is located only 180 kilometers off Florida on the American continent. Since 1976 the República de Cuba has been subdivided into 14 provinces of almost equal size and one special municipality (Isla de la Juventud). The total population is 11.3
Egypt occupies a leading political and cultural role in the Arab world as the region’s most populous state, with 72.6 million inhabitants. Until 1914, Egypt officially belonged to the Ottoman Empire. However, British economic and geopolitical interests in the region turned Egypt into a semi-colony from 1882 to 1952. The ongoing struggle for independence culminated
In its 543,965 square kilometers and some overseas dependencies, France has a population of 63 million. Currently under its Fifth Republic, a semi-presidential, semi parliamentary political system, and a founding member of the European Union, it is a democracy of long standing. As early as 1789, freedom of speech was one of the main claims
Germany is the most populous country in Europe, with 81 million inhabitants. Since 1990, it has been a federal republic consisting of 16 states. Until then the country had been separated into two states as a result of World War II (1939 –1945). Next to the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), established in the western
The six Arab countries of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) passed through similar development stages evolving comparable media systems. With the exception of Saudi Arabia, the smaller Gulf States had been British protectorates, gaining their independence only in 1971 (Kuwait in 1961). Since extensive oil production started in
India, with a population of more than a billion, is a multiethnic, multilingual, multireligious, pluralistic society. Politically it is a union of states (28 states and 7 union territories) and a sovereign, secular, democratic republic with a bicameral, multi-party, parliamentary system of government based on a universal adult franchise. It is governed by a written
Austria is a parliamentary democratic federal republic with a population of 8.26 million. The official language is German; regional official languages are Croatian, Slovenian, and Hungarian. The historical development of its media system can be divided into the following phases: the period 1621–1848 under the influence of censorship; the abolishment of censorship in the year
Argentina is located in the southernmost part of Latin America. It has more than 38 million inhabitants, the main language is Spanish, and the Catholic religion is predominant. Since 1983 it has had a democratic system of government which formally guarantees press freedom in its Constitution. Article 14 of Argentina’s National Constitution sets the guarantees
The evolution of the media system in Bolivia has been shaped by the nation’s particular geography, demography, culture, politics, and economy to produce a contradictory blend of innovation, richness, stagnation, and poverty. Land-locked in South America, Bolivia is perennially one of the most impoverished and politically unstable nations in Latin America, a legacy that has
Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world, surpassed only by Russia, China, the USA, and Canada. It has over 180 million people, the largest Portuguese-speaking population in the world. Independent since 1822, Brazil suffered in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries from several military and authoritarian regimes, and became a republican democracy again in
Canada is the world’s second-largest country by land area, occupying most of the northern part of North America between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and extending north to the Arctic Ocean. Originally founded as a union of British and former French colonies, Canada became a dominion in 1867 and gained independence from the United Kingdom
Chile is a country of over 16 million people, lying along the southwest coast of South America. Becoming independent from Spain after 1810, Chile evolved as a republic with strong democratic traditions, until a major coup in 1973. The development of media in Chile has been unique in its region, principally because of the following
Truth is a slippery concept, and philosophers since Aristotle have battled over its meaning. The most intuitive and widely adopted understanding of truth is that of correspondence theory – the idea that “true propositions tell it like it is;” that “for a proposition to be true is for it to correspond to the facts” (Blackburn
Most of what we know about violence in the media has explored violence on television. While some studies of television violence were conducted during the 1950s and 1960s, most of the information about the amount of violence on television in the US comes from the long-term research conducted as part of the Cultural Indicators (CI)
This article concentrates on media systems in countries of Sub-Saharan Africa. The SubSaharan media system was born in the colonial era. Following the partition of Africa in Berlin in 1884, the colonial era saw the establishment of mass media systems that initially served minority white settlers located in the emerging urban centers. Both early print
Since the earliest days of mass media, researchers, social critics, politicians, and the general public have been concerned about the extent to which media representations reflect or deviate from “reality.” Over the years, a great deal of research and public debate have revolved around the kinds of images of the world that are created and
Media content takes many forms and is differentiated by code and convention, genre and technology. The term “content” refers to the nature of the representations that are communicated by media genres and technologies rather than the medium in which they are carried. Fictional media content is one such classificatory grouping, signaling a similarity in the
The term media performance has a broad reference to the assessment of mass media according to a range of evaluative criteria and primarily employing “objective” methods. In practice most attention has been given to the product of mass media, its content as sent and received. The criteria applied are mainly derived either from professional goals
Conflicts are endemic to the known social world and can be defined straightforwardly as struggles between opposing interests and outlooks. How the media report and represent conflicts have been questions throughout the history of media and communications research. From early studies of propaganda in World War I to the latest research into the media’s role
The mass media are an important, if not the most important, factor in the development of free opinion in democracies. That is to say that the media have a specific democratic responsibility (McQuail 1987, 117–118). It is no wonder that, apart from freedom of speech, free journalism, and a free media system, the diversity of
Questions of media ethics address the way media practitioners – journalists, public relations (PR) representatives, bloggers, technical support staff – resolve various types of dilemmas they face, as well as the value judgments that media audiences make regarding media content and performance. What does it mean to be “responsible” as a media professional? How should
The accountability of the media is a normative notion that underlies the balance of freedom and social responsibility across media structure, performance, and product. In order to grasp the concept, we need to understand how closely related the two competing values of freedom and responsibility are. Press freedom has been constitutionally protected to guarantee a
“Radical media” is a term used by communication scholars to refer to information and communication technologies used by radical media activists to bring about social change. In this sense, the word “radical” means the expression of ideas, opinions, and options to reorganize society that are not sanctioned by the established social order. British communication scholar
Surveillance, correlation, and transmission functions are basic to the role of mass media in society. Surveillance means locating and disseminating news and information. Correlation deals with interpreting and editorializing about this information. Transmission is the socialization of norms, attitudes, and values between groups and generations (Lasswell 1948). Socialization research, for example, has compared the effectiveness
The term “social capital” has become a popular way for academics, activists, politicians, and the public to describe how an individual’s location in a structure of relationships, and the sense of trust and reciprocity that accompanies this social position, can provide the means for citizens to cooperate on problems requiring collective effort (Coleman 1990). It
Because there are various concepts of public opinion there are no general statements about the effects of mass media on it. Instead, the effects of mass media have to be related to specific concepts. Moreover, different study designs and methods have to be taken into consideration. According to the quantitative concept, public opinion is regarded
According to schema theory, the encoding and processing of information depends on learned, relatively stable cognitive structures in long-term memory, so called schemas (Information Processing). These cognitive structures include knowledge about concepts, persons, events, and the self. When individuals encounter a stimulus, they search their minds for the appropriate schema to match the stimulus. The
The term “indirect effects” denotes the consequences of direct effects on individuals who are not exposed to media content. According to Seymour-Ure (1974, 22), “a primary [=direct] effect takes place when the person affected has himself been involved directly in the communication process. A secondary [= indirect] effect takes place when individuals or groups not
In view of the preponderance of published research on the effects of the communication media, it is astounding, if not disconcerting, how little attention has been given to the systematic examination of the duration of these effects, and, as a result, how little is known about their duration. Such apparent neglect does not necessarily reflect
The established history of media effects research is characterized by a series of phases marked by fundamental paradigm shifts (see McQuail 1977, 72 –74; 2005, 457– 462; Lowery & DeFleur 1983, 22 –29; Severin & Tankard 2001, 262 –268; Baran & Davis 2006, 8 –17). Each of these phases is associated with particular concepts, researchers
The study of media effects has driven mass communication research for most of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Scholars have developed, tested, and supported various theories of media effects. The key to this research is uncovering the explanation for the way mass media exposure translates into effects. Over the history of our field, the study
Twenty-first-century mass communication scholars rarely question the existence of media effects. Research has presented significant and consistent evidence that the mass media have noticeable and meaningful effects. Evidence comes not only from the accumulation of the body of different studies, but from the various meta-analyses that organize various research studies and combine their findings to
As early as 1974, Ball-Rokeach presented the first in a series of papers that would unfold the concepts and assumptions of media system dependency (MSD) theory (Ball-Rokeach 1974). The paper was titled “The information perspective.” Its basic premise was that media effects flow from the information resources of the media system that are implicated in
In the 1940s, Paul F. Lazarsfeld defined international communication as a study of the “processes by which various cultures influence each other” (Lazarsfeld 1976, 485). The term culture has been defined in a variety of ways over the years. An all-encompassing definition of culture was given by Kroeber: culture “is a way of habitual acting
The mass media can be the major influence on the adoption of an idea after the general public begins to become aware. Initially, an idea spreads through limited social networks, with members exchanging information in formats ranging from face-to-face discussions to blogs on the Internet. Such interactivity means that participants are actively engaged in the
Emotions are commonly understood as a complex of interactive entities encompassing subjective and objective factors and consisting of affective, cognitive, conative, and physiological components. The affective component includes the subjective experience of situations, which is connected to feelings of arousal, pleasure, or dissatisfaction. The cognitive component refers to how situations relevant to emotions are perceived
The capacity for media messages to induce fear has been the object of scholarly inquiry since at least the 1930s when the Payne Fund Studies launched the first systematic effort to study the impact of media on children and adolescents. As part of that effort, Herbert Blumer (1933) found that 93 percent of the children
The term “privatization” refers to the transfer of property and/or operations from state or public ownership and control into private hands. Among the principal reasons given to justify privatization is that private ownership and operation make a company perform more efficiently because its managers will be financially obligated to make the company accountable to shareholders.
Just as there are numerous kinds of media – from electronic to print, local to worldwide – so too are there many different forms of media corporations. There are corporations that are vast multinational conglomerates operating in unrelated industries and spanning the globe, and those that focus on a single medium in a solitary market.
Because of the extensive penetration of media into society, and the different purposes and types of information conveyed, there are a number of possible media effects. For the sake of simplicity, these possible media purposes are categorized as those intended to persuade (e.g., advertising, propaganda), inform (e.g., news), or entertain (e.g., narrative television, film). In
Like many other spheres of contemporary life, the mass media have been profoundly affected by the processes of globalization. During the 1990s, the global media landscape was transformed as a result of the deregulation and privatization of broadcasting and telecommunication, enabling a quantum leap in the production and distribution of media products across continents and
When labor is in the news media, it reveals – perhaps more than any other subject – the economic, political, and professional conflicts between the practice of journalism and the business of media. The problem of the news media’s coverage of organized labor is that the news media are both the social institutions designated to
Markets are where media function. They also provide the foundation of economic analyses, providing the context and mechanisms for explaining and predicting media and audience behaviors. Economists define markets broadly as any context in which goods and services are offered and purchased. Markets are thus defined by a set of goods or services, the set
The issue of media conglomeration, or the phenomenon of a vast amount of cultural (media) production being controlled by a relatively small number of corporations, has generated heated debates among communication scholars, policymakers, and industry practitioners. In these debates, the concept of media conglomeration primarily refers to ownership structures within media and communications industries, as
The core task of media management is to build a bridge between the general theoretical disciplines of management and the specificities of the media industry. Media management is, however, neither a clearly defined nor a cohesive field but rather a loose agglomeration of work by researchers from various scientific fields. The syllabi from the rash
In an age of rapid technological innovation it would seem counterintuitive to assume that marketing and advertising techniques would remain stagnant; to survive and prosper, as in all aspects of business, marketers need to adapt their strategies and activities and advertisers need to evolve in terms of style, content, and media application. Media, both as
Structures of media ownership take the form of either public or private enterprises. “Public” refers to those media funded at least partially out of general public revenues, whereas in the general sense “private” means media whose financing is provided by individuals, families, or groups. Public media can be state-owned (as in the former Soviet Union)
All the goods and services used in everyday life possess intrinsic qualities that meet human wants, and even those that cater to basic needs, like hunger, may also satisfy a desire for beauty or a wish to communicate. Food is more enjoyable if made with love or artistically presented and served with style. These material
Media enterprises operating under various types of media systems globally all have incentives to perform well and compete with other media units and types for resources and a variety of rewards. The differences in how performance is determined and types of rewards provided vary among the systems, however. Media systems result from a variety of
Concentration of ownership in the media sector presents important problems for the cultural industries. First, concentration creates dominant positions for some players, which can affect the necessary pluralism of ideas in a society. From another point of view, there are strong pressures to allow strong players in a given market because of the growing trend
Consolidation refers to the expansion of media firms through mergers and acquisitions. Formally, it is distinct from the concentration of media markets, although the terms are often used interchangeably. To some observers, consolidation responds to the growth of new television networks and cable and satellite channels – e.g., MTV, HBO, ESPN, CNN, Fox News, Canal
Communication researchers have devoted a substantial amount of attention to understanding consumers in media markets. The processes by which audiences select between the various content options available, as well as the mechanisms by which media organizations seek to understand, anticipate, and respond to these choices have traditionally resided at the core of research focusing on
Diversification is a defining characteristic of media firms and products in the new millennium. There was a time when media companies concentrated on their core business, whether through management decision-making or government mandate, and when there were fewer distribution channels available to media producers. Time and innovation altered both of these to dramatic degrees. The
“Commerce” is a longstanding synonym for business as it is conducted in capitalist societies. It refers both to the institutions and practices of market economies and to the imaginative landscapes they produce. Commercial systems have two defining characteristics. Organizationally, they rest on the assumptions that competition between privately owned companies is the most effective way
The global network of Independent Media Centers (IMCs), or “Indymedia,” is a groundbreaking example of the power of an online, multimedia network providing for instantaneous, decentralized global communication, unique in that it involves a network of nonprofit, autonomous media collectives. These new technological capacities are shifting the nature of news consumption and provoking debates about
Research examining the influence of media exposure on audience members has long revealed that both the frequency and the nature of messages play a role in determining the outcomes of exposure. Consequently, documenting the manner in which different groups are represented in the media (alongside the rate of these depictions) is critical to understanding the
The term “Americanization” has been used with varying intended meaning and with varying degrees of precision over the last three or four decades of communication research. The common element is a reference to a process or trend affecting either the media of countries external to the USA or the generality of media and media-related practices
Questions of media ethics address the way media practitioners – journalists, public relations (PR) representatives, bloggers, technical support staff – resolve various types of dilemmas they face, as well as the value judgments that media audiences make regarding media content and performance. What does it mean to be “responsible” as a media professional? How should
Mass communication’s impact has been shown at an individual level and in society at large, yet all mass communication must pass through the same narrow gateway before having these varied effects. Unless people receive mass communication through their eyes, ears, or touch, and cognitively process it, it is powerless. This is why researchers are interested
Media advocacy is the strategic use of mass media to support community organizing and to advance public policy that improves health. The purpose of media advocacy is to put pressure on policymakers by setting the agenda and shaping debate to include policy solutions in news coverage of health issues. Media advocacy equips people to become
Media specialists are responsible for placing advertisements that will reach targeted customers and get the best response from the market for the least amount of money. Within the media department, media planners gather information about the sizes and types of audiences that can be reached through each of the various media and about the cost
Sexism in the media relates to concerns about a range of gender inequalities – in content, employment, policy, decision-making, and ownership – that have been a major focus of women’s liberation movements throughout the world since the 1970s. Mass media matter to women everywhere. They play a central role in the formulation and dissemination of
Sexualization is a concept used in communication research, primarily by feminist and gender studies researchers, to describe an increasingly close link between media images of men, women, and inanimate objects and human sexuality. Historical portrayals of sexuality tended to focus on psychological characteristics such as passivity and domesticity for women, and aggression and work for
Women’s media genres include women’s magazines and romances in print media, the soap opera on television, and romantic comedy in film. They are not generally the corollary of men’s media but defined in contrast to general audience media such as newspapers or “family genres,” including situation comedies, quiz shows, and action series on television. In
Grassroots media are small-scale, developed by and accessible to members of a local community or group, and conceptualized as a key tool in the process of social change. They have developed out of concerns with problematic representations of women and other marginalized peoples in mainstream media, as well as limited access to the media and
Heterosexism “refers to the belief and expectation that everyone is or should be heterosexual” and the term “heteronormativity” equates heterosexual experience with human experience, in effect “render[ing] all other forms of human sexual expression pathological, deviant, invisible, unintelligible, or written out of existence” (Yep 2002, 167). Heteronormativity provides a larger context for understanding how heterosexism
The focus of this article is upon representations of masculinity in one medium only, television, while making it evident that the approach adopted could be applied equally well to newspapers, magazines, radio, and film. Three broad phases can be identified in the evolution of televisual masculinities, a term coined to reflect the breakup of the
The ubiquity of sexualized images and narratives across all media forms signals the importance of this topic for research and analysis. In mainstream communications research in the US it has been located in the “media effects” tradition, where the emphasis has been on the moral risks of explicit sexual content to “family values” (Gunter 2002).
Sex role stereotypes represent women and men in highly generalized, often unrealistic, ways. Such media stereotypes are important because representation plays a key role in shaping what becomes social reality. Mediated messages influence knowledge as well as what is deemed significant and interesting (Brooks & Hébert 2006). Repeated media images shape attitudes, beliefs, and values.
Around the world, newspapers and magazines, cable and satellite television programs, radio broadcasts, documentary film, and more recently Internet sites produced by, for, and about women have been crucial to the process of resisting dominant conceptions of women, celebrating oppositional visions of womanhood, and adopting lives as “new women.” Until the 1960s, such journalism outlets
Feminist media pedagogy is a critical teaching practice and body of scholarship concerned with the lives and relationships of both women and men as mediated through cultural forms and institutions. Primarily, feminist media pedagogy focuses on the processes of teaching and learning about the politics of teaching and learning, especially as they are related to
The term “feminization” tends to be used in communication studies in two basic ways. On the one hand, it describes any increases in the proportion of women working in a particular media profession. On the other, it refers to a process in which communication norms, values, and behaviors coded as “masculine” are becoming gradually modified
Theorizing about gender and organizations has proved a complex challenge, resulting in a body of literature that is “patchy and discontinuous” (Ashcraft & Mumby 2004, xiii). Yet, around the globe, feminist scholars tend to agree on one universal impediment to gender equity: reality emerges from the male standpoint, which shapes organizations and meanings. For the
It is a phenomenon that can be observed in all industrialized societies that media use is connected with demographic factors. As a rule, people from different social backgrounds also use the media differently. On the other hand, people from similar social backgrounds also show similarities in their use of the media. Thus, there is a
Involvement is included in numerous theories and empirical studies of information processing, persuasion, advertising, knowledge acquisition, and other media effects. It is mainly linked with or defined as more elaborative, self-determined, active, and in-depth acting with and processing of media content. In origin, involvement is rooted in three major research traditions. In the work of
The Islamic Republic of Iran (population approx. 67,500,000 in 2004; adult literacy rate 77.1 percent) was established as a result of Iran’s revolution in 1979. The political system blends republican elements (i.e., regular parliamentary and presidential elections) with the idea of the “government of the Islamic jurist” (velayat-e faqih), developed during the 1960s and 1970s
Israel, a young democracy, established in 1948, with a 120-member unicameral parliament elected officially every four years in universal, proportional, nationwide elections, is located in the Middle East, along the eastern coastline of the Mediterranean Sea, bordered by Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Egypt. It lies at the junction of three continents: Europe, Asia, and Africa.
The term “media equation” means that media equal real life. It implies that people process technology-mediated experiences in the same way as they would do nonmediated experiences, because an “individual’s interactions with computers, television, and new media are fundamentally social and natural, just like interaction in real life” (Reeves & Nass 1996, 5). In 1996
The terms “pseudo-event” and “media event” refer to the phenomenon that in modern societies many events are created with the sole aim of getting media coverage, or rather that events are staged in a way that lends itself to media coverage. Boorstin (1961) created the term “pseudo-event”. He sees pseudo-events as “synthetic news.” They do
Ethnic media are media vehicles (e.g., specific programs, publications, promotional pieces) that carry culturally relevant messages designed for and targeted to a particular ethnic group. Studies have demonstrated the rapid growth and success of ethnic media in North America and throughout the world (Deuze 2006; Gross 2006; Ojo 2006). In the past, media planners were
Recently, the influence of affects and emotions in media exposure on the impact of media has become indisputable. Formerly, the emphasis was largely on cognitive aspects such as recall, learning, thoughts, and beliefs. The affective aspects were reserved for entertainment media, mostly limited to processes of involvement and gratifications. Nowadays, the borders between entertainment and
The term “online media” primarily refers to technical communication media where digital content is transmitted from any kind of server to distant receivers via the Internet (TCP/IP [transmission control protocol/Internet protocol]) or other digital networks, e.g., mobile services, and presented on a computer or a comparable terminal device (notebook, PDA [personal digital assistant], or mobile
The idea of using mass media for educational purposes is by no means a new one. Books, songs, games: all of these are forms of media that have served as effective educational tools for centuries. In the case of electronic media, however, many discussions of the media’s impact on children focus only on negative effects
Educational media content refers to mediated messages designed to teach or provide opportunities for learning. The nature of mediated education varies greatly, ranging from formal curriculum-based message systems designed for classroom consumption to informal or pro-social media messages with the potential for producing incidental learning or pro-social change. Brief History of Educational Media Content Education
From the 1980s onward, media technologies have gone through a phase of digitization. CDs and digital music media replaced records and tapes in the 1980s and 1990s, and movies are increasingly being produced and distributed digitally. Newspaper production has become computer based and the news is distributed not only on paper, but also digitally on
Many children today spend more time consuming media than they spend attending school, or in any other activity except for sleeping. By “media” we mean any form of mass communication such as television, Internet, video and computer games, comic books, and radio. Violence is a dominant theme in most forms of media. For example, content
There is a growing body of evidence that the mass media, especially television shows and movies, often induce fear and anxiety in children. Fear is an emotion characterized by the subjective feeling that one is in danger, and is usually accompanied by physiological reactions, including increased heart rate, blood pressure, muscle tension, and other forms
Traditionally, research into the effects of television has assumed that children are passive recipients on whom television has a powerful influence. Since the mid-1970s, however, media effects research has increasingly recognized the child viewer as an active and motivated explorer, rather than a passive receiver. Recent research suggests that children are critical evaluators of what
Media play an important role in the lives of adolescents and children. Especially as they age, today’s children and adolescents are very frequently connected to each other by means of some medium such as email, instant messenger, mobile phones, and beepers. However, when other media such as television, the Internet, video games, and music are
A common finding in media research is that age groups differ in the amount and functions of their media use. Communication scholars have pointed out two possible explanations for such differences. First, there are life-cycle or maturational explanations: media use is supposed to change across the life-span in response to an individual’s development. Second, there
Media are a crucial part of any advertising campaign. Selecting the most effective media gets the advertising message across to the intended target group. Media are also the most expensive part of advertising campaigns. In a typical media campaign, the media costs account for 80 – 85 percent of the advertising budget (Kelley & Juggenheimer
News media are the dominant way in which organizations of society disseminate information and persuasion to the general public. Networking, relationship building, and producing works to be published in the media are daily work for most public relations (PR) practitioners. The relation between the PR industry and the news media is therefore of interest for
Children, adolescents, and adults use many types of media. These include varieties that do not require input from the user, such as print media, movies, video tapes, DVDs, music, and television, as well as those with more extensive interactive possibilities, such as video games, computer applications, and Internet resources. As the media landscape has become
In democratic societies, the fundamental, core principle of freedom of speech must often be balanced with the need to protect children from harm. This issue has dominated the public debate over children and the media throughout the twentieth century, often moving to the forefront during the entry of a new medium, when parental anxieties are
Media relations specialists are experienced public relations specialists who have a broad working knowledge of television, radio, and print journalism and skills in establishing a controlled, positive image in the media for a company, person, or organization. They are also referred to as communications consultants. Media relations specialists serve as the liaison between the company
For a political system to be democratic – for ordinary people to have a meaningful role in the formation of public policy – an active citizenry must have the means to communicate their views about ideas and issues, among themselves and to political leaders. In a period of unprecedented advances in communication technology – more
Activist media are radio, television, and other media practices that aim to effect social change and that generally engage in some sort of structural analysis concerned with power and the reconstitution of society into more egalitarian arrangements. Many activist media practices are also committed to principles of communication democracy, which place at their core notions
Citizens’ media is a term used by communication and media scholars to refer to electronic media (i.e., radio, television, video) and information and communication technologies (i.e., text messaging, cellular telephony, Internet) that are controlled and used by citizens and collectives to meet their own information and communication needs. As an academic term, citizens’ media belongs
The concept of community media is understood as referring to small media institutions, often specifically to radio stations established in the so-called developing countries. These media have become ever more popular in recent years. However, the history of the concept is considerably older and more complicated. The objective of community media is to create local
Few would deny media’s increasingly central role in the everyday lives of most individuals, particularly in first and second world countries. And increasingly, few would deny media’s rhetorical influence in how people come to understand themselves and those around them. News media shape the way individuals see their communities as well as those on the
The term media refers broadly to the range of tools that humans have used throughout history to communicate with each other about a shared reality. The most common reference is to the set of modern technologies – from the printing press to the Internet – which facilitate communication across space, time, and social collectives. History
Media literacy has been defined as “the ability to access, analyze, evaluate and create messages across a variety of contexts” (Christ & Potter 1998, 7). This definition is widely accepted, although many alternative and competing conceptions also exist. As the subject of academic research, educational initiatives and communication policy (Potter 2004), research reflects enduring tensions
Pornography or “porn,” is a socially defined class of sexual communication, which may or may not be protected under national laws. The term may be distinguishable from legal definitions of obscenity or indecency. Pornography is generally considered the depiction of graphic sexual behavior usually designed to promote sexual arousal. Pornographic material may be either legal
Media policy involves policymaking – and the associated policy research – directed at a wide range of substantive issues and technological contexts, and employing a diverse array of theoretical and methodological perspectives. It is important to note, however, that in the communications field there are a large number of somewhat indistinct policy arenas that overlap
Access to the media encompasses the efforts and rights of individuals and groups to represent their views through the pages or airtime of established media entities – private or public. It should not be confused with access to information or even the related question of open-access television. The access-to-media question typically arises when a political
Perceptions of reality, or social reality, can be conceptualized as an individual’s conception of the world (Hawkins & Pingree 1982). What intrigues many social scientists is the exploration of the specifics of these perceptions and the ways in which they are developed. Social perception has been considered from both individual- and social-level perspectives. The individual-level
On the terrain of popular communication are cultural artifacts with a potential to entertain, inform, or persuade. Accordingly, dramatic media content has been investigated by way of five interdependent perspectives: (1) genre, (2) medium, (3) narrative, (4) ideology, and (5) meaning. Especially with regard to film and television, this generic designation has been fluid, with
Media ecology is a multidisciplinary field that studies the evolution, effects, and forms of environments. Media ecology is most often defined as both the study of media as environments and the study of environments – such as situations or contexts – as media. Scholars work within expansive definitions of media, ecology, and technology. Although “medium”
To take part in the democratic process, citizens should be well informed about politics, which implies they should keep up with current affairs through the news media. Given this essential role of the media for democracy, it seems important to know to what extent and why citizens actually use political media content. While comparatively few
Election polls have a long history of a symbiotic relationship with the media, dating back to the nineteenth century (Converse 1987; Frankovic 2008). However, it was not until the 1920s that polls insinuated themselves into the news operations of election coverage on a regular basis. Before the advent of the modern polling period, the major
Media economics is the application and study of economic theories and concepts to the media industries. Media economics encompasses all forms of media, including traditional media such as print, broadcasting, music, and film, and new media forms such as the Internet. Media economics scholarship is broad and diverse and includes such topics as policy and
The concept “mass media” is a collective term that stands for a broad variety of print media like newspapers, magazines, books and electronic media like radio, television, and the Internet. The concept “newspaper,” in turn, comprises daily and weekly newspapers, and “magazines” publications like news magazines, fashion magazines, sports magazines, etc. All mass media offer
Media history as a concept in its own right possesses a relatively recent lineage. In the early decades of the twentieth century, when references to “the media” – newspapers, magazines, cinema, radio, and the like – were entering popular parlance, university academics tended to be rather skeptical about whether these institutions were important enough to
Research in the sub-field of media production and content seeks to describe and explain the symbolic world of the media with reference to a variety of contributing societal, institutional, organizational, and normative factors. It draws boundaries around a large and diverse body of research efforts, predominantly social science, but also including more interpretive cultural analysis.
Typologies of media systems date to the publication of Four Theories of the Press, which proposed a typology of authoritarian, libertarian, social responsibility and Soviet Communist media systems. Hallin and Mancini’s typology of media systems in Western Europe and North America has influenced most recent work in comparative analysis of media systems. Hallin and Mancini proposed
Discussions of media in sociology are generally concerned with mass media and, more recently, new media. Mass media are defined as communication systems by which centralized providers use industrialized technologies to reach large and geographically scattered audiences, distributing content broadly classified as information and entertainment. Media reaching mass populations emerged in the late nineteenth century
This article investigates the intricate relationship between media exposure and the development of bulimia nervosa within the framework of health psychology. Beginning with an exploration of media portrayals of body image, we delve into the pervasive influence of unrealistic standards and idealized body types prevalent in fashion magazines, advertisements, and social media. Employing the Social
Hostile Media Bias Definition During George W. Bush’s first presidency, conservative writers Ann Coulter and Bernard Goldberg published books accusing the U.S. mainstream media of liberal bias. Liberal writer Al Franken replied with a book that denied liberal media bias and claimed that the same news outlets had right-wing economic and editorial leanings. Contradictory media
Otitis Media, a prevalent middle ear condition, holds significant implications in the field of school psychology. This article provides a comprehensive exploration of otitis media, encompassing its etiology, risk factors, and prevalence, shedding light on its impact on child development and school performance. Additionally, it discusses preventive measures, diagnostic methods, and intervention strategies. School psychologists
In contemporary society, a wide variety of violent content is reaching children through a variety of media including television, movies, and video games. Often, exposure to violence occurs with little adult or parental supervision. Several content analyses have examined the amount and content of violence on television. These analyses have shown that as of the
Media Violence Definition Media violence includes all forms of mass communication that depict the threat to use force, the act of using force, or the consequences of the use of force against animate beings (including cartoon characters or other species as well as humans). There are many forms of media, including TV programs, movies, video
This article explores the complex relationship between media influence and smoking prevention campaigns within the realm of health psychology. Beginning with an exploration of the prevalence of smoking and its public health implications, the study unfolds by examining the impact of media on smoking behavior, drawing insights from social cognitive theory and scrutinizing portrayals of
This health psychology article examines the intricate relationship between suicide and media influence, delving into the historical evolution of media coverage and its profound impact on suicidal behaviors. The exploration begins with an elucidation of suicide, emphasizing its significance within the realm of health psychology. The first section explores the portrayal of suicide in various