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KLAPPER’S PHENOMENSITIC THEORY:Klapper’s Generalizations, Criticism

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Theories of Communication ­ MCM 511
VU
LESSON 13
KLAPPER'S PHENOMENSITIC THEORY
Elite Pluralism
Like the other examples of limited effects theory, elite pluralism assumes that media have little ability to
directly influence people. Media alone cannot alter politics. Elite pluralism argues that media, in the
name of stability should reinforce political party loyalties and assist the parties to develop and maintain
large voter coalitions. Media shouldn't be expected to lead public opinion but rather reinforce it.
If change is to occur, it must come from the pluralistic groups and be negotiated and enacted by the
leaders of these groups.
This idea was spawned partly as an effort to make sense of the voter research initiated by Lazarsfeld in
the 1948 election. He and his colleagues found inconsistencies between their empirical observation of
typical voters and the assumption that classical democratic theory made. Classical democratic theory-
assumed that every one must be well informed and politically active.
But the new perspective based on empirical data showed that average people didn't care about politics.
Voting decisions were more likely to be based on personal influence than on reasoned consideration of
the various candidates. So they argued that voter apathy weren't really a problem for the political
system as a whole. They argued that we are better off if our political system changes very slowly over
time as result of gradual conversions. They believed that the important factor was not the quality of
voting decisions but rather their stability.
Klapper's Phenomenistic Theory
In 1960 Joseph Klapper at Colombia University concerned that average people exaggerated the power
of media. He introduced what he called PHENOMENISTIC THEORY.
He argued that media rarely have any direct effects and are relatively powerless when compared with
other social and psychological factors such as social status, group membership, strongly held attitudes,
education and so forth. His theory is often referred to now as reinforcements theory because a key
assertion is that the primary influence of media is to reinforce (not change) existing attitudes and
behaviors.
Instead of disrupting society and creating unexpected social change, media generally serve as agents of
the status quo, giving people more reasons to go on believing and acting as they already do.
He argued that there simply are too many barriers to media influence for drastic changes to occur except
under very unusual circumstances.
Klapper's Generalizations
·
Mass communication ordinarily does not serve as a necessary and sufficient cause of audience
effects, but rather functions among and through a nexus of mediating factors and influences.
·
These mediating factors are such that they typically render mass communication a contributory
agent, but not as the sole cause in a process of reinforcing the existing conditions. Regardless of
the condition in question and regardless of whether the effect in question be social or individual
the media are more likely to reinforce than to change.
·
On such occasions as mass communication does function in the service of change , one of the
two conditions is likely to exist; Either:
·
The mediating factors will be found to be inoperative and the effect of the media will be found
to be direct;
·
Or the mediating factors, which normally favor reinforcement, will be found to be impelling
toward change.
·
There are certain residual situations in which mass communication seems to produce direct
effects, or directly and of itself to serve certain psychophysical functions.
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Theories of Communication ­ MCM 511
VU
·
The efficacy of mass communication, either as a contributory agent or as an agent of direct
effect, is affected by various aspects of the media and communications themselves or of the
communication situation, including e.g. aspects of textual organization, the nature of the source
and medium, the existing climate of public opinion and the like.
Criticism
·  Downplays reinforcement as an important media effect
·  Is too specific to its time and media environment (no television)
·  Klapper's "nexus of mediation variables " that is church , family and school began to lose their
powerful position in people's so socialization - and therefore in limiting media effects
·  Many critical scholars see this as media's most negative influence
Assumptions of the limited effects paradigm
·  Empirical social research methods can be used to generate theory through an inductive research
process.
·  Exploratory, descriptive research is expected to produce empirical generalizations that can later
be combined to form middle-range theories.
·  Eventually, middle-range notions can be combined to create broad, powerful social theories that
are firmly grounded in empirical facts.
·  The role of mass media in society is limited; media primarily reinforce existing social trends
and only rarely initiate social change.
·  The media will cause change only if the many barriers to their influence are broken down by
highly unusual circumstances.
·  The empirical mass communication research supported this assumption. In study after study,
little evidence of strong media influence was found.
·  Mass media's role in the lives of individuals is limited, but it can be dysfunctional for some
types of people.
·  Media provide a convenient and inexpensive source of entertainment and information.
·  But neither use has much long-term or important impact on the daily life of most of people.
·  Almost all information is either ignored or quickly forgotten.
·  Entertainment mainly provides a temporary distraction from work, allowing people to relax and
enjoy themselves so that they can go back to work refreshed.
·  People who are adversely affected by media tend to have severe personality or social adjustment
problems; they would be deeply troubled even if media weren't available.
·  The U.S. political and social system is both stable and equitable
·  Although not democratic in the classical sense, the U.S. system id nevertheless a viable and
humane system that respects and nurtures cultural pluralism while preserving social order,
·  There is no need for radical reform.
·  Media play a limited, but nonetheless useful, functional role within the larger society.
·  Potentially harmful effects can be detected and prevented should any appear.
Drawbacks of the Limited Effects Paradigm
·  Both survey research and experiments have serious methodological limitations that were not
adequately recognized or acknowledged.
·  Empirical researchers were anxious to popularize their approach and sometimes made
exaggerated claims for it.
·  Naïve people outside the empirical research community made false assumptions about the
power and utility of this type of research.
·  When empirical researchers were directly challenged in the late 1960s, they were slow to
acknowledged limitations of their work and reacted defensively.
·  The methodological limitations of early empirical social research led to findings that
systematically underestimated the influence of mass media for society and for individuals.
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Theories of Communication ­ MCM 511
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·
Researchers like Lazarsfeld and Hovland were inherently cautious. They didn't want to infer the
existence of effects that might not be there ­spurious effects.
·
The researchers developed methods designed to guard against this, but they risked overlooking
or dismissing evidence that could have been interpreted as an argument for significant media
effects.
·
In their conclusion, they often failed to emphasize that they might be overlooking many types of
media effects because they had no way of measuring them.
·
Early empirical research centered around whether media had immediate, powerful, direct
effects; other types of influence were ignored.
·
First, the mass society paradigm, which had been dominant, asserted that such effects existed
and should be easy to observe. This paradigm needed to be evaluated and the early limited
effects research did so.
·
Second, the early research couldn't "see" an effect, it didn't exist. Only later, did researchers
develop techniques that permitted other types of influence to be empirically assessed.
Contributions of the Limited Effects Paradigm
·  The limited effects paradigm effectively replaced mass society theory as the dominant
perspective on media.
·  The limited effects paradigm lessened unjustified fears about massive, uncontrollable media
effects.
·  This benefited media practitioners.
·  Most important, it helped ease pressures for direct government censorship of media and
permitted media practitioners to implement useful forms of self-censorship.
·  The paradigm prioritized empirical observation and downgraded highly speculative forms of
theory construction.
·  It demonstrated the practicality and utility of empirical research and inspired development of
broad range of innovative methods of data collection as well as new techniques for data
analysis.
·  These empirical techniques have proved to be powerful and useful for specific purposes.
·  If the paradigm had not become dominant, scientists might not have devoted the time and
resources necessary to develop these techniques.
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Table of Contents:
  1. COMMUNICATION:Nature of communication, Transactional approach, Communication is symbolic:
  2. THEORY, PARADIGM AND MODEL (I):Positivistic Perspective, Critical Perspective
  3. THEORY, PARADIGM AND MODEL (II):Empirical problems, Conceptual problems
  4. FROM COMMUNICATION TO MASS COMMUNICATION MODELS:Channel
  5. NORMATIVE THEORIES:Authoritarian Theory, Libertarian Theory, Limitations
  6. HUTCHINS COMMISSION ON FREEDOM, CHICAGO SCHOOL & BASIC PRINCIPLES OF SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY THEORY
  7. CIVIC JOURNALISM, DEVELOPMENT MEDIA THEORY & DEMOCRATIC PARTICIPANT THEORY
  8. LIMITATIONS OF THE PRESS THEORY:Concentration and monopoly, Commercialism
  9. MCQUAIL’S FOUR KINDS OF THEORIES:Social scientific theory, Critical theory
  10. PROPAGANDA THEORIES:Origin of Propaganda, Engineering of Consent, Behaviorism
  11. PARADIGM SHIFT & TWO STEP FLOW OF INFORMATION
  12. MIDDLE RANGE THEORIES:Background, Functional Analysis Approach, Elite Pluralism
  13. KLAPPER’S PHENOMENSITIC THEORY:Klapper’s Generalizations, Criticism
  14. DIFFUSION OF INNOVATION THEORY:Innovators, Early adopters
  15. CHALLENGING THE DOMINANT PARADIGM:Catharsis Social learning Social cognitive theory
  16. SOCIAL COGNITIVE THEROY:Symbolizing Capacity, MODELLING
  17. MODELING FROM MASS MEDIA:Recent research, Summary, PRIMING EFFECTS
  18. PRIMING EFFECT:Conceptual Roots, Perceived meaning, Percieved justifiability
  19. CULTIVATION OF PERCEPTIONS OF SOCIAL REALITY:History
  20. SYSTEMS THEORIES OF COMMUNICATION PROCESSES:System
  21. EMERGENCE OF CRITICAL & CULTURAL THEORIES OF MASS COMMUNICATION
  22. REVISION:Positivistic perspective, Interpretive Perspective, Inductive approach
  23. CRITICAL THEORIES & ROLE OF MASS COMMUNICATION IN A SOCIETY -THE MEDIATION OF SOCIAL RELATIONS
  24. ROLE OF MASS MEDIA IN SOCIAL ORDER & MARXIST THEORY:Positive View
  25. KEY PRINCIPLES USED IN MARXISM:Materialism, Class Struggle, Superstructure
  26. CONSUMER SOCIETY:Role of mass media in alienation, Summary of Marxism
  27. COMMUNICATION AND CULTURE:Neo Marxism, Characteristics of Culture
  28. HEGEMONY:What exactly is the meaning of "hegemony"?
  29. CULTURE INDUSTRY:Gramscianism on Communications Matters
  30. POLITICAL ECONOMIC THEORY I:Internationalization, Vertical Integration
  31. POLITICAL ECONOMIC THEORY II:Diversification, Instrumental
  32. POLITICAL ECONOMIC THEORY III:Criticism, Power of Advertising
  33. AGENDA SETTING THEORY:A change in thinking, First empirical test
  34. FRAMING & SPIRAL OF SILENCE:Spiral of Silence, Assessing public opinion
  35. SPIRAL OF SILENCE:Fear of isolation, Assessing public opinion, Micro-level
  36. MARSHALL MCLUHAN: THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE AND MASSAGE
  37. KNOWLEDGE GAP THEORY:Criticism on Marshal McLuhan
  38. MEDIA SYSTEM DEPENDENCY THEORY:Media System Dependency Theory
  39. USES AND GRATIFICATIONS THEORY:Methods
  40. RECEPTION THEORY
  41. FRAMING AND FRAME ANALYSIS:Information Processing Theory, Summing up
  42. TRENDS IN MASS COMMUNICATION I:Communication Science, Direct channels
  43. TRENDS IN MASS COMMUNICATION II:Communication Maxims, Emotions
  44. GLOBALIZATION AND MEDIA:Mediated Communication, Post Modernism
  45. REVISION:Microscopic Theories, Mediation of Social Relations