TASK 2: USES AND GRATIFICATIONS

Objective: 
1. Explanation of Uses and Gratifications theory  
2. Application of Uses and Gratifications theory to a contents page of a music magazine

DEFINITION: 

Uses and gratifications theory is an approach to understanding why and how people actively seek out specific media to satisfy specific needs. In 1960s, as the first generation to grow up with television became grown ups, it became increasingly apparent to media theorists that audiences made choices about what they did when consuming texts. Far from being a passive mass, audiences were made up of individuals who actively consumed texts for different reasons and in different ways. UGT is an audience-centred approach to understanding wider communication. Diverging from other media effect theories that question "what does media do to people?", UGT focuses on "what do people do with media?"

EVIDENCE: 

1. In 1948 Lasswell suggested that media texts had the following functions for individuals and society: 

• entertainment, surveillance, 
• correlation and cultural transmission. 

2. Blulmer and Katz expanded this theory and published their own in 1974, stating that individuals might choose and use a text for the following purposes (i.e. uses and gratifications): 

• Diversion - escape from everyday problems and routine.
• Surveillance - Information which could be useful for living eg) weather reports, financial news, holiday bargains

Uses and Gratifications has been extended, particularly as new media forms have come along (eg video games, the internet)