We learnt earlier that studies in perception helped to nail the coffin on the “magic bullet” theory. Perception is a large subject. But we shall confine ourselves to the area most relevant to our concern: the ways in which people perceive media messages targeted at them. In particular, we shall be looking at selective perception along with other related selectivities. But first, what is perception?
i. The process of making sense out of experience (Burgoon and Ruffner: 1978, p.104).
ii. How the individual makes sense of his or her world (Corner and Hawthorn: 1980, p.104).
Perception depends on a complex of variables such as psychological disposition, past experiences, cultural expectations and social relationships. All these in conjunction with language constraints and the
“limited experience factor” result in the selective perception process, which takes place in a ‘stop-gate’ fashion with selective exposure, selective attention and selective retention. In other words, you have to be exposed to a message before you can attend to it, you have to pay attention before you can perceive the message, you have to perceive it before you can retain it for later recall.
Selective Exposure
It is only natural that people seek out information that caters for their own interests, confirms their beliefs, and boosts their own ego, while avoiding those that are contrary to their own predispositions and attack their self-image. This determines which papers they subscribe to or read at all, which television stations they turn to, and which programmes they watch on those channels.
Selective Attention
Because the eye processes information much faster than the brain can interpret, the human brain has to select which information to pay attention to at any given time, in order to avoid confusion. Physiological impairments or needs (bad eye sight, hunger), physical hardship (heat in a crowded lecture room, boredom from fatigue, hostile orientation toward information or source, assumed familiarity with message content, etc. can also severally or in combination affect the span of attention — during lecture, media programme, etc. (hence advertisers use all kinds of gimmicks to catch and retain audience attention).
Selective Perception
The study of perception actually led to the discovery of the selectivity processes. Each of us tends to perceive and then decode communication messages in the light of our previous experiences and current dispositions, our needs, moods and memories. The language we speak and words we use also tend to circumscribe our perception. De Fleur and Bull- Rokeach recall how scientists for a long time considered the atom indivisible because the Greek word “atom” means “indivisible”. They also recall how malaria remained uncontrollable for a long time because doctors believed it was caused by the “bad air” (from Italian “mala aria”) of the tropics.
Selective Retention
None of us can retain for later recall all the messages we receive.
Moreover, some messages are forgotten more quickly than others. We more accurately remember messages that are favourable to our self-image than messages that are unfavourable. The saliency of the message (relevance to our needs), the method of transmission and the interests and beliefs of the receiver are also known to affect retention rate.
Selective exposure, attention, perception and retention work together in rather complex ways, not in isolation, and they contribute to the cultivation of the attitudes of acceptance, avoidance, rejection and denial. And they render it unlikely for any person to be a passive, helpless receiver of media messages.
Selective Retention Selective Perception Selective Attention Selective Exposure
Figure 6: Four Concentric Rings, representing the four
SELF-ASSESSMENT EXERCISE 2.3
Reflect honestly on an occasion on which selective attention cost you or a friend the understanding of an important aspect of one of your courses. What were your or his/her eventual reaction and action?
4.0 CONCLUSION
The emergence of the “Limited Effects Perspective” was inevitable.
People were bound to realise sooner or later that the mass media could not exercise in peacetime the same degree of influence which they were supposed to have exercised during the war! The subtle advent of empirical research, and other advances on the intellectual horizon, simply accelerated that realisation. Perhaps the effects of war on media effects deserve more serious studies than may have been undertaken so far.
5.0 SUMMARY
In this unit, we have seen how continued progress on the intellectual horizon dislodged the traditional stimulus–response/mass society perspective with the ensuing Magic Bullet/Hypodermic Needle/Transmission Belt theory. The intellectual advances occurred in various fields but they all worked together to shed invaluable light on the nature of the interactions between society and her mass media.
Prominent among the intellectual advances were results of laboratory experiments in general psychology, findings from studies in rural sociology, and introduction of empirical research in the field of mass communication itself.
6.0 TUTOR-MARKED ASSIGNMENT
Attempt a two-page succinct comment on the difference between the Stimulus– Response (S-R) pattern as understood in the immediate post-WW II period and the pattern as “discovered” by Stephen Covey from a recent library search (Covey: 2004). What does the difference show about intellectual progress? Mention one or two other fields in which the kind of change involved here has taken place, with brief comments on the social impact of the change(s).
7.0 REFERENCES/FURTHER READING
Folarin, B. (2005) Theories of Mass Communication: An Introductory Text (3rd edition). Ibadan: Bakinfol Publications, in association with E-Watch Print Media.
Lazersfeld, P.I., B. Berelson, and H. Gaudet (1994) The People’s Choice: How the Voter Makes Up His Mind in a Presidential Campaign. New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce.
UNIT 3 MINIMAL EFFECTS INTERFACE