Functions of Mass Media
The mass media serves information, interpretation, instructive, bonding, and diversion functions. Gatekeepers function to expand, reinterpret, and limit messages. This includes fact checking, additional research, and deciding what gets relayed through media channels. Cultivation theory suggests media shapes our reality, offering a distorted view of violence and risk.
7 Basic Functions of Mass Media:
- Sending and sharing information is a major function.
- Media provides entertainment, education, and acts to persuade and surveil.
- It offers interpretation, linkage, and aids in socialization.
4 Major Functions of Communication:
Communication in an organization serves to:
- Control
- Motivate
- Inform
- Allow emotional expression
It’s essential for maintaining order, improving performance, keeping employees informed, and facilitating social interaction. Effective business communication should be clear, concise, objective, consistent, complete, relevant, and understanding of audience knowledge.
Purposes of Mass Communication
Three Main Purposes:
Mass communication includes entertainment, education, and political propaganda. It relies on mass media to send messages to large audiences, influencing political power, buying habits, and social norms. Inventions like the printing press and the telegraph, alongside the rise of the internet and digital media, have revolutionized mass communication, widening the range of voices and perspectives but also raising concerns about misinformation.
Most Popular Function:
Most mass communication serves to entertain and inform. People turn to media to escape boredom and find relief from life’s predictability. It functions to inform, validate social norms, offer companionship, transmit culture, mobilize in crises, and provide a platform for correlation and sensationalization.