Week 1.

Audience

Whether you are constructing a text or analyzing one, you will need to consider the destination of that text( i.e. its target audience) and how that audience(or any other) will respond to that text.

EFFECTS MODELS

This is a theoretical explanations of how humans ingest the information transmitted by media texts and how this might influence or not their behavior.

1.The Hypodermic Needle Model (1950s)- audience passively receive the information.

2.Uses & Gratifications (1970s)- Far from being a passive mass, audiences were made up of individuals who actively consumed texts for different reasons and in different ways.

• Diversion, escape from everyday problems and routine

• Personal Relationship, using the media for emotional and other interaction(i.e. substituting soap operas with family life)

• Persona identity, finding yourself reflected in texts, learning behavior and values from texts

• Surveillance, information which could be useful for living( i.e. weather reports, financial news holiday bargains)

3. Reception Theory (1980-90s)- considering gender, class, age, ethnicity.