Report on Theories for Peter
THE HYPODERMIC NEEDLE MODEL The hypodermic needle model was developed in the 1920's and the 1930's and it argues that the audience of a certain media product are always passive in the way that they perceive things. It states that ideas and themes are injected into people's minds. This means that the consumer would have no control at all over their response to the stimulus. Some examples of this would be the radio broadcast of War of the Worlds in 1938 or even Nazi Propaganda during WW2. The response that was created widely by the War of the Worlds broadcast and the propaganda alike was mass hysteria. The main drawback of this theory is that it assumes that no one has individual views or reactions. Which can be argued against a lot as obviously people develop their own thoughts and opinions. THE USES AND GRATIFICATIONS MODEL The uses and gratifications model is based on the idea that consumers of media are active and that their responses to media are completely