USES AND
GRATIFICATIONS THEORY
Explanation of
Theory:
Blumler and
Katz’s uses and gratification theory suggests that media users play an active
role in choosing and using the media.
Users take an active part in the communication process and are goal
oriented in their media use. The
theorist say that a media user seeks out a media source that best fulfills the
needs of the user. Uses and gratifications
assume that the user has alternate choices to satisfy their need.
Theorists: Blumler and Katz
Date: 1974
GATE KEEPING
THEORY
Kurt Zadek Lewin
(1890-1947), was born in German. He was a great Psychologist and pioneer in
Social Psychology. He developed the concept in the field of psychology called
psychological “field” and “life space” in order to understand the human
behavior and its important consideration of total life space. His studies are
more based on to understand a person’s own world, physical, mental and social
through frequent conversation between his pre-memories, desire and his goals.
And also his works help to understand the relationship between attitudes and
behavior in the group or individuals.
Kurt Lewin coins
the word called “Gate keeping”. It’s nothing but to block unwanted or useless
things by using a gate. Here the person who make a decision is called
“Gatekeeper”. At first it is widely used in the field of psychology and later
it occupies the field of communication. Now it’s one of the essential theories
in communication studies.
Concept:
The Gatekeeper
decides what information should move to group or individual and what
information should not. Here, the gatekeeper are the decision makers who
letting the whole social system. The gatekeeper is having its own influence
like social, cultural, ethical and political. Based on personal or social
influences they let the information to the group. Through this process the
unwanted, sensible and controversial information’s are removed by the gate
keeper which helps to control the society or a group and letting them in a
right path. In home mother plays the vital role and she has to decide what
their kid’s needs and what should avoid.
In news medium
editor play vital role. He has to decide what kind of news items will publish
and what should not. Every day the news
channel receives various news items from all over the world. The channel have
its own ethics and policies through this the editor decide the news items for
publish or aired. In some cases few news items are rejected by the editor due
the organizations policy or the news items which are not suitable for publish.
Example:
An international
news channel receives numbers of news items within day like international
terror issues, UN discussions, Texas bull fighting and religious abuse on
international community.
A news channel
can’t show all those news items to audience because it may affect the channel
reputation in public and organizations policy. Here, editor decides the news
items especially he can’t show the Texas bull fighting because it is not
internationally popular story. But the same time the news channel can’t show
the religious abuses also because it may hurt audience directly and it may
affect organizations policy also. But international terror issues and UN
discussions are universal common news that won’t affect the channel reputation
in public and organizations policy.
News items:
N1: Texas bull
fighting, N2: International terror issues, N3: UN discussions, N4: religious
abuse on international community
Gatekeeper:
Chief Editor
Selected News
Items:
N2:
International terror issues, N3: UN discussions,
Discarded News
Items: (on popularity)
N1: Texas bull
fighting
Discarded News
Items: (on policy)
N4: Religious abuse
on International community
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