I VOLUME x

THE INTERNATIONAL
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF
COMMUNICATION
EDITED BY I WOLFGANG DONSBACH

RHETORIC IN WESTERN EUROPE: FRANCE -

STRUCTURATION THEORY

ii
© 2008 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd

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4836 Stimulus–Response Model

Peffley, M., Shields, T., & Williams, B. (1996). The intersection of race and crime in television news
stories: An experimental study. Political Communication, 13, 309–327.
Speed, L. (2005). Life as a pizza. The comic traditions of Wogsploitation films. Metro, 146/147,
136–144.
Tamborini, R., Mastro, D. E., Chory-Assad, R., & Huang, R. (2000). The color of crime and the
court: A content analysis of minority representation of television. Journalism and Mass
Communication Quarterly, 77(3), 639–653.
Yelenevskaya, M., & Fialkova, L. (2004). My poor cousin, my feared enemy: The image of Arabs in
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0?August
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STIMULUS–RESPONSE
???
?? 2007
Articles MODEL

Stimulus–Response Model
Frank Esser
University of Zurich

The stimulus–response model is associated with the assumption that the mass media has
powerful effects. Also referred to as the “hypodermic needle theory,” “transmission belt
theory,” or “magic bullet theory,” it can be considered one of the first general conceptions
describing mass media effects (→ Media Effects, History of). Lowery and DeFleur (1995)
summarized the basic assumptions behind the stimulus–response or hypodermic needle
theory as follows: (1) people in a mass society lead socially isolated lives, exerting very
limited social control over each other because they have diverse origins and do not share
a unifying set of norms, values, and beliefs; (2) similar to higher animals, human beings
are endowed at birth with a uniform set of instincts that guide their ways of responding
to the world around them; (3) because people’s actions are not influenced by social ties
and are guided by uniform instincts, individuals attend to events (such as media messages)
in similar ways; and (4) people’s inherited human nature and their isolated social
condition lead them to receive and interpret media messages in a uniform way.
In this model, media messages are seen as “symbolic bullets,” striking every eye and ear,
resulting in effects on thought and behavior that are direct, immediate, uniform, and
therefore powerful. According to the generally accepted history of media effects research,
the stimulus–response model was the guiding perspective in the media effects field during
the early days of communication study. Although this “received view” on the field’s
history does not go unquestioned, it is still influential.

ORIGINS OF THE MODEL

During the early decades of the twentieth century, communication scholars derived the
stimulus–response model from a questionable interpretation of the psychological and
sociological theories prevalent at that time (DeFleur & Ball-Rokeach 1982). First, so-
called instinct psychology, developed shortly after the turn of the century, was interpreted
to show that the media targeted stimuli toward internal, biologically determined drives,
emotions, and other processes beyond rational control. Therefore, the same, or at least
 Stimulus–Response Model 4837

similar, reactions were triggered in all individuals. Second, theories of mass society,
prevalent during that time period, were construed to state that the audience existed in an
urbanized and industrialized society that was volatile, unstable, rootless, alienated, and
inherently susceptible to manipulation. As a result, people were regarded to be defenseless
against and at the mercy of the capricious stimuli of the media. This was particularly the
case as early ideas maintained that mass media were run primarily by people and
organizations that were deliberately trying to exert a targeted influence upon recipients
(like media tycoons, wartime governments, and advertisers; → Propaganda; Advertising).
The third factor contributing to a belief in all-powerful mass media was early pro-
paganda research in the United States. According to → Harold D. Lasswell, who dealt with
World War I propaganda in his doctoral dissertation, “the strategy of propaganda . . . can
readily be described in the language of stimulus–response. The propagandist may be said
to be concerned with the multiplication of those stimuli which are best calculated to evoke
the desired response, and with the nullification of those stimuli which are likely to instigate
the undesired response” (Lasswell 1927, 630). The standard history of the field interprets
this quotation by Lasswell – who undoubtedly was one of the fathers of mass communication
research – as representative of the mindset of the generation of media scholars at that time.
In the 1930s there was much concern in the United States over the success of Nazi
propaganda in Hitler’s Germany. At that time there were also regular demonstrations by
Nazi supporters in many places in the US, as, for example, in New York’s Madison Square
Garden. For this and other reasons the Institute for Propaganda Analysis was founded in
1937, and social psychologist Hadley Cantril became its first president. Cantril’s study
The invasion from Mars (1940) is generally seen as the fourth most impressive piece of
evidence for the efficacy of the stimulus–response model: the right stimulus – a frightening
media message – almost automatically led to a panic reaction on the part of the defenseless
recipients. On October 30, 1938 a fictional radio drama unleashed mass panic. Orson
Welles had staged H. G. Wells’s War of the Worlds in such a gripping and vivid manner that
many radio listeners who had missed the announcement and beginning of the program
were convinced their lives were threatened by an invasion from Mars. On the next day, the
front-page headline of the New York Daily News proclaimed: “Fake Radio War Stirs Terror
Through US.” Finally, Merton’s 1946 analysis of a Kate Smith war bond drive also reflects
the assumptions of the stimulus–response model. Merton (1946) wrote that “never before
the present day has the quick persuasion of masses of people occurred on such a vast scale
. . . Masses of men move in paths laid down for them by those who persuade.”
Merton, Herbert Blumer, and Cantril also discussed intervening variables in the causal
process but the standard history of the field interprets their studies as being motivated by
an initial belief in the stimulus–response model of mass communication. How did this
become the “received view” of the field? Because the first – and vastly influential –
historical construction of media effects research stated that it was so. This refers to the
book Personal influence (1955) in which → Elihu Katz and → Paul Lazarsfeld asserted
that early effects research was guided by the following framework: “that of the
omnipotent media, on the one hand, sending forth a message, and the atomized masses,
on the other, waiting to receive it, and nothing in between.” Their account is seen as the
“most important source” for the standard construction of media effects history (Delia
1987). Other research monographs (Klapper 1960), essays (Bauer & Bauer 1960), and
4838 Stimulus–Response Model

textbooks (DeFleur & Ball-Rokeach 1982) repeated this received history for generations
of communication scholars.

CRITICISM OF THE STIMULUS–RESPONSE MODEL

Recently, increasing numbers of scholars have been disputing this received view and
arguing that the direct effects, or hypodermic needle, model was never endorsed by early
mass communication research, but that it was instead a straw man invented by Katz &
Lazarsfeld (1955) that they could easily knock down by demonstrating its weaknesses.
Lang and Lang (1981) were the first to dismiss the standard history by stating: “Few, if
any, reputable social scientists in the pre-World-War II era . . . worked with what was later
described as the hypodermic needle model.” Even 15 years later, Lang (1996, 15) had still
not managed “to find a footnote to a scholarly book or article that espouses it.” Indeed,
authors who proclaimed that the stimulus–response model was the prevalent paradigm of
this time cite not one study from the 1920s or 1930s that could be considered mass
communication research and at the same time would support their stimulus–response
claims. Hence, Chaffee and Hochheimer (1985) argue that the hypodermic needle model
described by Katz and Lazarsfeld misrepresents the field’s history; indeed, that it was
created as a foil against which their own limited effects model could be contrasted and
presented as an impressive paradigm shift.
What are the critics’ arguments in dismissing the recorded history above? First, they
doubt that early media effects researchers were strongly influenced by nineteenth-century
European social theorists like Toennies, Durkheim, or Le Bon and their concepts of mass
society – so much so, that some critics (e.g., Chaffee & Hochheimer 1985) voiced doubts
that there were ever any serious proponents of mass society theory. As Czitrom (1982)
concluded, “the whole notion of a theory of mass society was something of an artificial
and spurious construct, an intellectual straw man created by its opponents.” Katz (1987),
as a direct target of these allegations, recently admitted that empirical studies at the time
were indeed not guided by mass society theory; nevertheless, he believes that “it was a
highly prevalent image among both political and cultural philosophers.”
Second, critics of the standard theory have difficulty taking seriously the isolated
reference that Lasswell makes to stimulus–response in his propaganda study. They point
out that early propaganda studies were more descriptions of content and of execution
than they were tests of effects, and that they had little to do with communication research
as we know it (Lang & Lang 1981; Delia 1987). They also point out that Lasswell played
no important role in media effects research of the time – he was cited in no significant
effects study during this time period (Chaffee & Hochheimer 1985; Delia 1987).
The third reason lies in a diametrically opposite interpretation of early classic studies
like Cantril’s War of the worlds study or the famous Payne Fund studies. Both investi-
gations in no way discovered uniform stimulus–response effects. Instead, they recognized
early on that there were individual differences in reactions to media stimuli. In addition,
consideration of intervening and mediating variables (→ Media Effects: Direct and
Indirect Effects) showed that these reactions had been based on conditional instead of
direct effects (Lang & Lang 1981; Wartella & Reeves 1985). Bineham (1988) explains the
differing interpretations of these early studies with the idea that advocates and critics of
 Stimulus–Response Model 4839

the received view had a very different understanding of what the hypodermic needle
model meant. Advocates see the recognition of intervening variables as mere elaborations
upon the hypodermic model if the studies still assume that mass communication is a
one-directional and linear process; critics of the received view see the recognition of
differences among media audiences and the inclusion of mediating variables as a break
from the established tradition (Bineham 1988).
It can be concluded that within the social science tradition of media effects research,
the position occupied by critics of the received history has rapidly gained popularity and
persuasiveness. However, the opposing camp has seen some changes. It is no longer
populated by those early authors who adopted Katz and Lazarsfeld’s (1955) first scheme
without further reflection. Instead, it now consists primarily of critics of social-science-
oriented media effects research. These are primarily representatives of a critical or cultural
paradigm who see most social scientific or empirical effects research as an elaboration of
the hypodermic model tradition because – in their view – it conceptualizes the sender,
message, and receiver as isolatable elements and sees the receiver as a largely passive target
of message manipulation (Bineham 1988; → Critical Theory; Cultural Studies). Bineham
(1988) sees the battle for the past as a highly significant effort between opposing camps to
define the history of mass communication research in specific ways in order to justify
their current respective positions.

SEE ALSO:
Advertising
Communication as a Field and Discipline
Commun-

ication and Media Studies, History to 1968
Critical Theory
Cultural Studies

Katz, Elihu
Lasswell, Harold D.
Lazarsfeld, Paul F.
Media Effects: Direct
and Indirect Effects
Media Effects, History of
Media Effects, Strength of

Propaganda

References and Suggested Readings

Bauer, R. A., & Bauer, A. H. (1960). America, mass society and mass media. Journal of Social Issues,
16, 3–66.
Bineham, J. (1988). A historical account of the hypodermic model in mass communication.
Communication Monographs, 55, 230–246.
Bryant, J., & Thompson, S. (2002). Fundamentals of media effects. Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill.
Cantril, H. (1940). The invasion from Mars: A study in the psychology of panic. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press.
Chaffee, S. H., & Hochheimer, J. L. (1985). The beginnings of political communication research
in the United States: Origins of the “limited effects” model. In E. M. Rogers & F. Balle (eds.),
The media revolution in America and in western Europe. Norwood, MA: Ablex, pp. 267–296.
Czitrom, D. J. (1982). Media and the American mind: From Morse to McLuhan. Chapel Hill, NC:
University of North Carolina Press.
DeFleur, M. (1998). Where have all the milestones gone? The decline of significant research on the
process and effects of mass communication. Mass Communication and Society, 1, 85–98.
DeFleur, M. L., & Ball-Rokeach, S. J. (1982). Theories of mass communication, 4th edn. New York:
Longman.
Delia, J. G. (1987). Communication research: A history. In C. R. Berger & S. H. Chaffee (eds.),
Handbook of communication science. Newbury Park, CA: Sage, pp. 20–98.
Katz, E. (1987). Communication research since Lazarsfeld. Public Opinion Quarterly, 51 (special
issue), S25–S45.
4840 Stock Photography

Katz, E., & Lazarsfeld, P. F. (1955). Personal influence: The part played by people in the flow of mass
communication. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.
Klapper, J. T. (1960). The effects of mass communication. New York: Free Press.
Lang, G. E., & Lang, K. (1981). Mass communication and public opinion: Strategies for research. In
M. Rosenberg & R. H. Turner (eds.), Social psychology: Sociological perspectives. New York: Basic
Books, pp. 653–682.
Lang, K. (1996). The European roots. In E. E. Davis & E. Wartella (eds.), American communication
research: The remembered history. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, pp. 1–20.
Lasswell, H. (1927). The theory of political propaganda. American Political Science Review, 21, 627–
631.
Lowery, S. A., & DeFleur, M. L. (1995). Milestones of mass communication research: Media effects,
3rd edn. White Plains, NY: Longman.
Merton, R. (1946). Mass persuasion. New York: Harper.
Wartella, E., & Reeves, B. (1985). Historical trends in research on children and the media: 1900–
1960. Communication Research, 35, 118 –133.
0?September
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STOCK
???
?? PHOTOGRAPHY
Articles
2007

Stock Photography
Paul Frosh
Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Stock photography is the name given to a particular type of standardized commercial

imagery. This largely consists of clichéd photographs of consumer well-being or corporate
achievement: the happy couples on sun-drenched beaches pictured in travel adverts, and
the well-groomed businessmen shaking hands who tend to grace company brochures
(→ Advertisement, Visual Characteristics of). Stock photography is also the name of the
industry that manufactures, promotes, and distributes these images for use in → marketing,
→ advertising, publishing, and increasingly multimedia products, websites, and other
digital platforms (for instance, the sunsets and cloud images one can find on mobile
phones). Worth an estimated US$2 billion annually, the industry continues to expand
into new areas of image production and supply: its leading corporations own some of the
most important historical photographic archives, manufacture and market stock film
footage, and compete with traditional sources of → photojournalism. Despite the ubiquity
of its products, and estimates that it supplies a majority of the photographs used in
advertising and marketing, the stock photography industry is largely overlooked by
researchers into photography and consumer culture (exceptions include Miller 1999;
Frosh 2003; Machin 2004), and is invisible to the general public.

THE EMERGENCE AND FUNCTIONING OF THE STOCK

PHOTOGRAPHY INDUSTRY
Stock photography emerged as a full-fledged, self-conscious industry in the 1970s (on
historical precursors see Hiley 1983; Wilkinson 1997). Its main commercial premise is
that advertising agencies will find it cheaper, faster, and less risky to “rent” readymade
 Media Effects, History of 2891

Milavsky, J. R., Stipp, H. H., Kessler, R. C., & Rubens, W. S. (1982). Television and aggression: A
panel study. New York: Academic Press.
Mundorf, N., Drew, D., Zillmann, D., & Weaver, J. (1990). Effects of disturbing news on recall of
subsequently presented news. Communication Research, 17(5), 601–615.
Singer, J. L., & Singer, D. G. (1981). Television, imagination, and aggression: A study of preschoolers.
Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Tewksbury, D., Jones, J., Peske, M. W., Raymond, A., & Vig, W. (2000). The interaction of news and
advocate frames: Manipulating audience perceptions of a local public policy issue. Journalism
and Mass Communication Quarterly, 77(4), 804–829.
Zillmann, D. (1989). Effects of prolonged consumption of pornography. In D. Zillmann & J. Bryant
(eds.), Pornography: Research advances and policy considerations. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence
Erlbaum, pp. 127–157.
Zillmann, D., & Brosius, H.-B. (2000). Exemplification in communication: The influence of case
reports on the perception of issues. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Zillmann, D., & Weaver, J. B. (1999). Effects of prolonged exposure to gratuitous media violence on
provoked and unprovoked hostile behavior. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 29(1), 145–165.
Zillmann, D., Hoyt, J. L., & Day, K. D. (1974). Strength and duration of the effect of aggressive,
violent, and erotic communications on subsequent aggressive behavior. Communication
Research, 1, 286–306.
Zillmann, D., Chen, L., Knobloch, S., & Callison, C. (2004). Effects of lead framing on selective
exposure to Internet news reports. Communication Research, 31(1), 58–81.
0?August
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MEDIA
???
?? 2007
EFFECTS,
Articles HISTORY OF

Media Effects, History of

Frank Esser
University of Zurich

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, studies,
and historical circumstances that influenced ideological development regarding media
effects (→ Communication as a Field and Discipline).

THE FOUR PHASES OF MEDIA EFFECTS PARADIGMS

The first phase, from World War I to the end of the 1930s, was characterized by the
assumption that the effects of the media on the population would be exceedingly strong.
The media were credited with an almost limitless omnipotence in their ability to shape
opinion and belief, to change life habits, and to mold audience behavior more or less
according to the will of their controllers (McQuail 2005, 458). The power of media messages
over unsuspecting audiences was described in drastic terms: the mass media supposedly
fired messages like dangerous bullets, or shot messages into the audience like strong drugs
pushed through hypodermic needles. These descriptions gave rise to the “hypodermic-
needle concept” (Berlo 1960, 27), the “magic bullet theory” (Schramm 1973, 243), and the
2892 Media Effects, History of

“transmission belt theory” (DeFleur & Ball-Rokeach 1982, 161). Instinct psychology and
the theory of mass society were interpreted to show that people in urbanized and
industrialized society were rootless, alienated, and inherently susceptible to manipulation.
As a result, they were defenseless against and at the mercy of the capricious stimuli of the
media – particularly as early ideas maintained that the mass media were run primarily by
people and organizations that were deliberately trying to exert a targeted influence upon
recipients (→ Stimulus–Response Model).
The second phase of the standard history lasted approximately from the end of the
1930s to the end of the 1960s and was distinguished by the assumption that the media
were largely not influential. The research group of → Paul F. Lazarsfeld ushered in the
deconstruction of the bullet theory. The results of their empirical, social-scientific
election study, The people’s choice (1944), moved interest away from what the media did
to people and toward what people did with the media. Rather than seeing a society of
fragmented individuals receiving all-powerful messages from the mass media, the view
shifted to one of a society of individuals who interacted within groups and thus limited
the effects of media messages. Early on, Lazarsfeld et al. (1944) defined all three key
concepts that Joseph T. Klapper (1960) later united and used as the basis of his limited
effects theory. These three concepts also characterized the second phase of effects research.
They state that: (1) people use → selective exposure and selective perception to protect
themselves from media influences, accepting almost exclusively only such information
as corresponds to their previously established attitudes (→ Selective Perception and
Selective Retention); (2) → opinion leaders initiate a → two-step flow of communication
by absorbing ideas and arguments from the mass media and then communicating these –
transformed – ideas to less active individuals; (3) social group formation enhances the
role that → interpersonal communication plays in protecting an individual member from
a change of opinion, as members do not wish to lose membership in their relational
group (→ Katz, Elihu).
The third phase, from the end of the 1960s through the end of the 1970s, was chara-
cterized by the rediscovery of strong media effects. According to standard media effects
history, an essay by → Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann entitled “Return to the concept of
powerful mass media” (1973) may be considered to have set the program for the
movement into the third phase (see Severin & Tankard 2001, 264; McQuail 2005, 460). A
number of highly regarded studies showed that it was possible for the media to overcome
some selectivity processes in a television-saturated environment. Near the end of the
1940s Herbert Hyman and Paul Sheatsly (1947) published a study in Public Opinion
Quarterly entitled “Some reasons why information campaigns fail”; then, a quarter of a
century later, Harold Mendelsohn (1973) used the same forum to proclaim the exact
opposite: “Some reasons why information campaigns can succeed.” Three distinct
features are attributed to this phase: more sophisticated methods of analysis (→ Research
Methods), more specific hypotheses, and more highly differentiated theoretical appro-
aches. Thus, survey data and content analysis data could be combined long-term with
the help of time-series analyses or panel design studies (→ Survey; Content Analysis,
Quantitative). In addition, effects research since that time has been less focused on crude
changes in attitude or behavior, and more interested in subtle changes in our perception
of the world.
 Media Effects, History of 2893

The fourth phase of the standard media effects history extends through to the present
time and is characterized by “negotiated” or “transactional” effects (McQuail 2005, 461).
Now the central premise maintains that the media exert their greatest influence when they
become involved in the process of constructing sense and meaning. Typical theories con-
nected with this new approach are social → constructivism, → cultivation theory, framing
(→ Framing Effects), and → information processing theories. McQuail considers research
in this vein to be driven by two insights:

First, media “construct” social formations and even history itself by framing images of reality
(in fiction as well as news) in predictable and patterned ways. Second, people in audiences
construct for themselves their own view of social reality and their place in it, in interaction
with the symbolic constructions offered by the media. The approach allows both for the power
of media and for the power of people to choose, with a terrain of continuous negotiation in
between, as it were. (McQuail 2005, 461)

CHALLENGES TO THE FOUR-PHASES MODEL

The oversimplified account of the received view of media effects history has been
criticized harshly in recent times. Lang and Lang (1993, 93) called the alleged sequence of
phases unrealistic “paradoxes” that feigned contradictions that had never existed. Instead,
they maintained that “a considerable continuity” had been prevalent in the research
community over the decades (Lang & Lang 1981, 662). Even proponents of the phase
model felt forced to play down its heuristic value as time progressed (see McQuail 2005,
460). It seems that the model was able to establish itself so firmly because it offered a clear
summary of a complex developmental process. However, current thought considers it
evident that, in every period, studies could be identified that indicated limited or powerful
effects – depending on what → operationalizations, conceptualizations, definitions,
measurements, designs, and variables were used (→ Measurement Theory; Media Effects,
Strength of).
Likewise, careful reanalyses of research literature from the first phase of effects studies
show that “few, if any, reputable social scientists in the pre-World War II era . . . worked
with what was later described as the hypodermic needle model” (Lang & Lang 1981, 655).
Even the empirical findings from the second phase, upon closer inspection, show no
justification for an overall verdict of media impotence (Lang & Lang 1981, 659). Instead,
numerous studies from that time indicating the presence of media effects can be
identified. Due to the prevailing opinions of the time, however, no notice was taken of
these findings. Two main factors explain the successful run enjoyed by the “minimal effects
myth”: first, there was an exaggerated concentration of a limited range of effect types
(especially short-term attitude change during election campaigns); second, there was a
one-sided and inappropriate interpretation of the results of three key studies, which
further secondary literature adopted without additional review.
In the first of these key studies, Lazarsfeld et al.’s The people’s choice (1944), the data in
no way unequivocally supported both central investigative findings – the importance of
interpersonal communication (“two-step flow”) and of reinforcement instead of chance
(“minimal effects”). In spite of the fact that 61 percent of the interviewees named
newspaper (23 percent) and radio (38 percent) as their “most important sources” of
2894 Media Effects, History of

information during the election, the authors alleged that it is not the media but people
who can move other people (although less than one fourth cited a personal source as
important). Moreover, in spite of the fact that 8 percent of those questioned did indeed
alter their voting decision because of media influences, the authors interpreted this as
evidence for a lack of effect (see Chaffee & Hochheimer 1985, 273, 279). Not only is 8
percent a considerable change, it should also be noted that the authors were concerned
only with voting intention and ignored other possible political effects where media
impact might have been even greater (→ Election Campaign Communication).
In the second key study, Personal influence (1955) by Katz and Lazarsfeld, an inappropriate
claim was made to the effect that all previous effects research had been based on the
following framework: “that of the omnipotent media, on the one hand, sending forth the
message, and the atomized masses, on the other, waiting to receive it – and nothing in
between” (1955, 20). In retrospect, Katz (1987, S35) admitted that early empirical
communications research seems not to have based its efforts on the idea outlined in 1955,
which propounded an omnipotent media and the stimulus–response model arising from
this assumption. Nevertheless, Katz and Lazarsfeld’s book created a mythos that has
definitively influenced the history of this field even up to today (see Delia 1987, 65–66).

BIASED PERCEPTIONS OF MEDIA EFFECTS

From Klapper’s synopsis The effects of mass communication (1960), the third key work of
that era, secondary literature adopted primarily those conclusions that pointed to
minimal effects, failing to subject these inferences to review. However, Klapper did also
clearly define conditions under which the media could develop strong effects. Even so,
since he provided only very few pieces of evidence and examples for these in his one-sided
presentation, they made no impression on the readers of the time or on later generations
of research (see Perse 2001, 25). In addition, Klapper worked as director of social research
for CBS, one of the largest media corporations in the United States (→ Television
Networks), and media companies were uninterested in evidence supporting the strength
of the media. Quite the contrary: they were interested in evidence proving the insignific-
ance of media effects and used Klapper’s book to argue against regulation (Perse 2001, 28).
The apparent change of mind leading to the rediscovery of strong effects may also be
better explained by factors outside of, rather than within, the research world. The rapid
spread of television during the 1960s and 1970s lent a political dimension to the field
of effects research (→ Television: Social History). Influential commercial and political
forces increasingly accused the media of failing to respect these entities’ interests and,
consequently, of distortion. Such allegations drew heightened public attention to the
effectiveness of the media.
Today, a growing number of scholars agree that the established standard history of the
field is misleading because it tends to ignore those findings that do not fit neatly into the
stage-by-stage scenario. Many authors (e.g., Lang & Lang 1981; Chaffee & Hochheimer
1985; McLeod et al. 1991; Wartella 1996; Bryant & Thompson 2002) have thus concluded
that the development of mass media effects research did not move in pendulum
swings from “all-powerful” to “limited” to “rediscovered powerful” to “negotiated” effects.
Bryant and Thompson (2002, 42, 58) argue that the body of media effects research from
 Media Effects, History of 2895

the beginning showed overwhelming evidence for significant effects. Thus, the sum total
of all these considerations yields the conclusion that the history of media effects research
still waits to be written (see Wartella 1996, 179).

SEE ALSO:
Communication as a Field and Discipline
Constructivism
Content

Analysis, Quantitative
Cultivation Theory
Election Campaign Communication

Framing Effects
Information Processing
Interpersonal Communication
Katz,
Elihu
Lazarsfeld, Paul F.
Measurement Theory
Media Effects
Media Effects,
Strength of
Noelle-Neumann, Elisabeth
Operationalization
Opinion Leader

Research Methods
Selective Exposure
Selective Perception and Selective Reten-
tion
Stimulus–Response Model
Survey
Television Networks
Television:
Social History
Two-Step Flow of Communication

References and Suggested Readings

Baran, S. J., & Davis, D. K. (2006). Mass communication theory, 4th edn. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Berlo, D. K. (1960). The process of communication. An introduction to theory and practice. New York:
Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Bryant, J., & Thompson, S. (2002). Fundamentals of media effects. Boston: McGraw-Hill.
Chaffee, S. H., & Hochheimer, J. L. (1985). The beginnings of political communication research in
the United States: Origins of the “limited effects” model. In E. M. Rogers & F. Balle (eds.), The
media revolution in America and in Western Europe. Norwood, NJ: Ablex, pp. 267–296.
DeFleur, M. L., & Ball-Rokeach, S. J. (1982). Theories of mass communication. New York: Longman.
Delia, J. G. (1987). Communication research: A history. In C. R. Berger & S. H. Chaffee (eds.),
Handbook of communication science. Newbury Park, CA: Sage, pp. 20–98.
Hyman, H. H., & Sheatsly, P. B. (1947). Some reasons why information campaigns fail. Public
Opinion Quarterly, 11, 412–423.
Katz, E. (1987). Communication research since Lazarsfeld. Public Opinion Quarterly, 51 (special
issue), S25–S45.
Katz, E., & Lazarsfeld, P. F. (1955). Personal influence. Glencoe, IL: Free Press.
Klapper, J. T. (1960). The effects of mass communication. New York: Free Press.
Lang, G. E., & Lang, K. (1981). Mass communication and public opinion: Strategies for research. In
M. Rosenberg & R. H. Turner (eds.), Social psychology: Sociological perspectives. New York: Basic
Books, pp. 653–682.
Lang, G. E., & Lang, K. (1993). Perspectives on communication. Journal of Communication, 43, 92–99.
Lazarsfeld, P. F., Berelson, B., & Gaudet, H. (1944). The people’s choice. How the voter makes up his
mind in a presidential election. New York: Columbia University Press.
Lowery, S. A., & DeFleur, M. L. (1983). Milestones of mass communication research: Media effects.
White Plains: Longman.
McLeod, J. M., Kosicki, G. M., & Pan, Z. (1991). On understanding and misunderstanding media
effects. In J. Curran, M. Gurevitch, & J. Woollacott (eds.), Mass media and society. London:
Edward Arnold, pp. 235–266.
McQuail, D. (1977). The influence and effects of mass media. In J. Curran, M. Gurevitch, &
J. Woollacott (eds.), Mass communication and society. London: Edward Arnold, pp. 70–94.
McQuail, D. (2005). McQuail’s mass communication theory, 5th edn. London: Sage.
Mendelsohn, H. (1973). Some reasons why information campaigns can succeed. Public Opinion
Quarterly, 37, 50–61.
Noelle-Neumann, E. (1973). Return to the concept of powerful mass media. Studies of Broadcasting,
9, 66–112.
Perse, E. (2001). Media effects and society. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
2896 Media Effects Models: Elaborated Models

Schramm, W. (1973). Men, messages, and media. A look at human communication. New York:
Harper and Row.
Severin, W. J., & Tankard, J. W. (2001). Communication theories: Origins, methods, and uses in the
mass media, 4th edn. New York: Longman.
Wartella, E. (1996). The history reconsidered. In E. E. Davis & E. Wartella (eds.), American
communication research: The remembered history. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, pp. 169–180.
0?August
Original
MEDIA
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?? 2007
EFFECTS
Articles MODELS, ELABORATED MODELS

Media Effects Models: Elaborated Models

Elizabeth M. Perse
University of Delaware

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 of media effects has been driven by generalized views about how media effects
occur. These general views serve the field as models, or simplified representations of the
media effects process. Different models about media effects place different weight on
either media content or the audience in providing the central explanation of media effects.
Moreover, different models focus on different variables as central to understanding media
effects (→ Media Effects, History of).
The first model of media effects emerged in the early twentieth century. This model was
grounded in sociological views of the mass society and psychological interests in
stimulus–response models. This first model has been termed the “hypodermic needle” or
direct effects model, because mass communication was seen as an effective stimulus to
evoke predictable responses from isolated and helpless audiences.
A second model developed around 1940. This model, limited effects, reflected researchers’
beliefs that media’s dominant effect was reinforcement. According to this model, because
of the audience’s tendency toward → selective exposure, attention, perception, and recall
(→ Selective Attention; Selective Perception and Selective Retention), most media
messages were filtered and rejected unless they supported pre-existing beliefs and
attitudes (e.g., Hovland et al. 1949; Katz & Lazarsfeld 1955).
A third model grew out of the rapid adoption of television in the 1960s (→ Television:
Social History). Television viewing grew steadily and content analyses revealed that there
were few thematic differences in the content of the three dominant channels. Scholars
began to believe that television could overcome selectivity processes. That is, exposure to
television insured exposure to particular themes and images. This model is characterized
as a return to the era of powerful effects.
The widespread adoption of → cable television, remote control devices, and the
broadband world wide web (→ Internet) have shifted media use away from a static, time-
and-space-bound delivery mode to one that allows the audience to select what media to