Theorists

Theorists Relating To Audience

Cultivation Theory - George Gerbner

The idea that exposure to repeating ideas and representations over long periods of time can influence the way the audience views and perceives the world around them, which can lead to enforcing ideas of moral panic etc.
The idea that cultivation creates mainstream values (dominant ideologies).

Albert Bandura - Media Effects

• The idea that media can implant ideas in the mind of the audience indirectly.
• Idea audiences acquire attitudes, emotional responses and new styles of conduct through modelling.
• Idea that media representations of transgressive behaviour, such as violence for physical aggression, can lead audience members to imitate those forms of behaviour, e.g the violent behaviour portrayed in video games like call of duty. 

Stuart Hall - Reception Theory

Cultural theorist Stuart Hall developed a theory called Reception theory that suggests audiences have different reactions to media texts like films, documentaries, newspapers and even images. These two readings are...

Preferred Reading - How the creator intended the media to be viewed by the audience.
Oppositional Reading - Where the intended meaning is completely opposed by the reader, e.g. a piece of media that might be seen as sexist or racist etc.
Negotiated Reading - A compromise between the preferred and oppositional readings, the audience understands and agrees with the text, but disagrees with other areas and has their own views on it which opposes what the creator intended.

Different viewers all have different readings of media texts and Hall believed this was based on everyone's different experiences and beliefs, which helps shape our viewpoint on different topics.

Hypodermic Syringe Model

The hypodermic syringe approach to media effects believes that there is a direct correlation between violence and anti social behaviour portrayed in films, video games, on television and in rap music. The model suggests that children and teenagers are vulnerable to media content because they are still in the early stages of socialization and are therefore very impressionable and likely to imitate what they see in the media.

Theorists Relating To Language

Steve Neale - Genre Repetition And Difference

• "Genres are instances of repetition and difference"
• "Difference is absolutely essential to the economy of genre"

Steve Neale is saying that a film and it's genre are defined by two things:

• How much it conforms with a genre's stereotypes and conventions. He says that a film must conform to these conventions enough that it can still qualify and be identified as a film of that genre.
• How much a film undermines the genre's stereotypes and conventions.

Roland Barthes - Semiotics (Denotation & Connotation)