Approaches to Media Audiences

Module code: MS7003

Module Outline

This module will introduce you to a range of different approaches to researching media audiences, focusing on the ways in which audiences understand various kinds of media and programmes, how this understanding relates to their identities and contexts, and how audiences contribute to the media itself in the age of the internet.

Topics

• Key theories and models of media influence, media audiences and media consumption.
• The historical progression of research on media influence and media audiences.
• The socio‐political context of models of media audiences and media influence.
• Models of persuasive communication, effects, political agenda‐setting, socialisation and cultivation.
• Key theories of media, audiences, and socio‐political development.
• Key approaches to the study of media audiences, influence and consumption.
• The social/audience/research implications of new media and communication technologies.