mass-communication-theory

Chapter 7 Moving Beyond Limited Effects: Focus on Functionalism and Children 207
medium, television, the clear presence of significant
social upheaval, and a weakening of those
traditional forces’ influence over young people
gave rise to several penetrating looks at the
(macro-level) role of mass communication in the
functioning of the American social system as well
as the (micro-level) influence of media on viewer
aggression.
The rise of functionalism, middle-range, and
systems theories in the 1950s and 1960s encouraged
theorists to move beyond simplistic, fragmented,
linear models of mass communication.
At a time when limited-effects notions dominated,
functionalism’s value-neutrality was attractive to
researchers and theorists studying media’s influence,
especially as functional analyses accepted
the presence of latent as well as manifest functions.
The strategy of developing middle-range
theory offered hope of moving beyond the empirical
generalizations produced by run-of-the-mill
effects research. These generalizations could be
“added up” to create broader theories of media.
Ultimately, functionalism’s promise to more
meaningfully alter the direction of mass communication
theory was weakened by its inability to
draw definitive conclusions about effects and by
what many saw as its status quo orientation, as
exemplified by research on the narcotizing dysfunction
and mass entertainment theory.
Some mass communication researchers
looked to a concept related to functionalism developed
by communications engineers, systems,
which evolved from cybernetics, the study of the
regulation and control of complex machines.
Systems consist of sets of parts interlinked so
changes in one part induce changes in other
parts. Systems theory allows the creation of
models demonstrating the interdependence, selfregulation,
and goal-orientation of systems. The
application of systems theories to mass communication
raised many important questions that
forced reconsideration of the limited-effects
perspective.
Reconsideration of limited-effects thinking
about media also came from people interested
in the influence of mediated violence on subsequent
viewer aggression. Television and children
were the focus of this inquiry. Defense of the media
(and the limited-effects perspective) came
from proponents of catharsis, the idea that viewing
violence substitutes for the actual demonstration
of aggression by the viewer. But this theory
was ultimately discredited as social cognitive theory
became widely accepted.
Social cognitive theory proved to be a useful
way of understanding how people learn behaviors
from television. By differentiating between
imitation and identification and identifying several
different modeling processes, such as observational
learning, inhibitory and disinhibitory
effects, and vicarious reinforcement, it helped explain
how individuals learn from the media. Even
as these ideas have been applied to “new” media
such as video games, they have left many questions
unanswered, especially as these insights
were extrapolated from micro-level analyses
(where they were initially formulated) to more
macro-level explanations of effects.
Research regarding aggressive cues and priming
effects attempted to add some specificity to
social cognitive theory, as did the developmental
perspective. Another advance was the consideration
of different contextual variables, aspects of
the presentation of violence in the media content
itself, in determining the amount of learning
from viewing. Still another was a reconception
of the young audience—the active theory of television
viewing—that, although not dismissing
media effects, did suggest that young viewers
have more influence over their interaction with
media than social cognitive theory seemed to
imply.
The demonstration of significant media effects
on individuals naturally led to the critical study of
larger, macro-level effects, especially in the realm
of mass communication and the socialization of
children. Early notions of media as an early window
on the world have recently been updated and
expanded into important work on the redefinition,
or even the loss, of childhood itself.
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