mass-communication-theory

functionalism
Theoretical approach
that conceives
of social
systems as living
organisms whose
various parts
work, or function,
together to
maintain essential
processes
communication
systems theory
Theory that examines
the mass
communication
process as composed
of interrelated
parts that
work together to
meet some goal
social cognitive
theory
Theory of learning
through interaction
with the
environment that
involves reciprocal
causation of
behavior, personal
factors, and
environmental
events
Chapter 7 Moving Beyond Limited Effects: Focus on Functionalism and Children 175
These changes—in American society and in mass communication theory—were significant.
American technological know-how had helped win World War II, and in
the 1950s it provided many citizens with a comfortable and independent lifestyle.
At the heart of this success were increasingly complex large-scale social, economic,
and technological systems. Surely factors such as new communication technologies,
efficient superhighways, universally available home ownership and higher education,
the population’s migration to the suburbs, an exploding advertising industry,
women entering the workforce in ever larger numbers, expanded leisure time, the
rise of the youth culture with its new music and social styles, the geographic displacement
of millions of GIs as they were ushered out of the military, the increased
voice and visibility of racial minorities, and the Cold War with its threat of imminent
global destruction (to name only a few) worked—or functioned—together to
produce the America that offered so much that was good and so much that was
troubling.
Mass communication theories needed to be developed to explain media’s role
in the operation of our society, but they could not stray too far from the dominant
thinking of the time that media had, at most, limited effects. As such, functionalism
“became dominant in American [social] theory in the 1950s and 1960s. The cornerstone
of functionalist theory is the metaphor of the living organism, whose parts
and organs, grouped and organized into a system, function to keep its essential
processes going. Similarly, members of a society can be thought of as cells and its
institutions as organs whose functioning … preserves the cohesive whole and maintains
the system’s homeostasis” (Bryant and Miron, 2004, p. 677). Through functionalism,
mass communication’s obvious influence on the social world could
be explained and understood, and at the same time that effect could be seen as
“limited” by other parts of the system.
But some researchers thought that functionalism could also be applied to the
study of mass communication itself and not just to the social system it helped support.
The resulting communication systems theory offered hope to those who were
beginning to reject limited-effects notions. They argued that a communication systems
theory could allow us to conceptualize the role of media in the society at large
and assess the usefulness of the powerful new communications technologies. Perhaps
media’s power could be better assessed at the macroscopic level—that is, by
understanding its larger role in the social system.
During this same period of great social upheaval, psychologists, unfettered by
communication researchers’ adherence to the limited-effects perspective, thought
they could explain some of the turmoil in microscopic—that is, individual—terms.
Psychologists turned their attention to how people, especially children, learned
from the mass media, especially television. What would eventually become known
as social cognitive theory and its early focus on children moved communication
theorists even further from a focus on limited or minimal media effects. They directed
much of their attention toward increases in the amount of real-world violence
and the possible contribution of the new medium of television to that rise.
“The media” was one of the factors eventually blamed for causing or aggravating
violent actions.
Social scientists developed several different perspectives on the effects of television
violence, including catharsis, social learning, social cognitive theory, aggressive
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