 So before I start talking about the users and gratifications theory, which is the topic we're going to discuss today, I'll just take a small look back at a very important theory which is known as the mass society theory that we should know about before we start talking about users and gratifications and all these things. So this is how the communication theory started where people thought that media had extreme power and especially during the early 20s and 30s when it was the age of propaganda and all that people thought that mass media was extremely powerful and the average people were just helpless victims of powerful mass media. There absolutely no way to resist the influence of mass media nor could they do anything about deciding whether to be exposed to mass media or not. So initially our audience was conceived as a homogeneous mass that would consume content in an uncritical and superficial manner. They had no control whatsoever over the amount of media they would consume or even how they would consume so on and so forth. So that is how mass society theory started off and audience was thought to be passive then. They would absorb content whatever was given to them without much critical analysis. It was just the concept of audience we had at that point of time was not only homogeneous but also passive and the powerful and the effect of media content was unidirectional and powerful. That means there was absolutely no view or theorists of that time had no idea about audience members reaction or effect on the media itself. We'll see later that even that has some effect on media content how the audience behaves or what the audience wants. So this is just a very, very small background of the mass society theory which considered media to be extremely powerful and audience to be passive. This was some kind of an oversimplification of how audience members would use, consume and make sense of media messages. And users and gratifications theory is more about how audience members use and make sense of media messages. And I don't want to get into the details of Marshall McLuhan's work around the same time in the 1960s especially on technological determinism. So that was again another factor which made people to rethink the role of media as being extremely powerful. And that also was in certain ways influenced by this limited effects theories. Again as I said this is just for backdrop of today's presentation. The limited effects theories has two main components to it. One component is that media's power is shaped by or the impact of media or the effect of media on different individuals is shaped by their inherent personal factors. It could be their own intelligence or their self-esteem or whatever. So that meant that the media was not as powerful as it was believed to be but it affected different people differently. And the other limited effects theory category was that about the social categories model. So that posited that media's power was limited by audience members own associations and group affiliations. Now we are aware of the two step flow model or the personal influence theory of Lazarsfeld. So this belongs to that particular category. So going back to mass society theory to limited effects theory. So that was one step forward in the direction that media was not as powerful as it was thought to be. And it was shaped by individual differences. It was shaped by the communities or the categories to which people belong to. Again, there were three important factors during the 70s. Two theoretical factors and one methodological factor which led the researchers to talk about users and gratifications theory in the manner that we know about it today. So one of the two theoretical developments was the assumption or was the conclusion that people's active use of media was a very, very important. So whether we regard media as powerful or not depends on how people use it. And that was one factor that was not considered in our earlier theories when we were talking of the limited effects theories that no media was not powerful enough. There were individual differences and there were differences because people belong to certain communities. Later it was found out that there were very, very important factors including what people or how people use media. Or how they were actively using media. I will keep on using this term active in certain senses. But this was one important theoretical development. The other theoretical development or the other conceptual idea that came to being around that point of time was that most of the effects that people were talking about or most of the effects that media scholars were talking about were the negative effects of media. So it could be intended, it could be unintended, but generally when people spoke of powerful effects, media effects theory, they were talking of the negative effects of the media. The intended positive uses of media, not effect, the positive uses of media. In today's presentation we will talk about what these positive uses are. So that were being ignored. And the third development during that particular time which is more of a methodological development was the growth and the development in the new survey research methods and data analysis techniques which allowed people to interpret how various audiences were making use of media and what gratifications they were getting from media. So these techniques were not present in the 50s or 40s. So that is why a lot of research in this particular area was not even possible. So just going back from a mass society theory to limited effect to the realization that the audience itself could be active. It's not always passive or they're not always uncritically consuming media content. And then this methodological development. So these three developments led to this idea of audience as being active. And these are four factors of activity. There might be many others, but these are generally regarded as four very, very important factors of activeness of the audience. So what utility they make of media. It's not about what how media influence that it's about. It's also about what uses we make of the media. It's also about intentionality that whenever and we will talk about this in greater details as well that what uses we make of media. It is something which is deliberate something that is known to me something that I decide it is not something that is accidental or it is not something that is imposed on me. So that question of intentionality is also one attribute of an active audience. The third part is about selectivity. And this is something that we can we can understand from our everyday usage of media as well. Why do we decide to read say for example times of India compared to Hindustan times or the Hindu or whatever. Or why do we watch our stuff and not NDTV or whatever. So whenever we are making that selection we are portraying our activity or we are we are presenting ourselves as an active audience. So selectivity is also a very, very important attribute of active audience. And finally imperviousness to influence. So and that is related to media literacy also in certain ways that I'm aware that media is trying to influence me. So I'm able to resist that influence or I'm able to resist that effect. So these are four parts of active audience that came to being during this journey of media research scholars from mass society theory. As I said to limited effects theory and finally to the active audience paradigm. Before I get into the users and gratifications theory it's important to again you know talk about this very important development which took place in the field of psychology basically. And this is the well-known Maslow's hierarchy of needs which most researchers and students are aware of. So around this time there was this needs research or how or what were the basic and the psychological needs of human beings universally. And we understand that you know right from the basic needs of physiological needs food, water, shelter etc. To safety to social needs to esteem needs and finally self-actualization. So this kind of research was also going around that point of time. And that is what led to the development of users and gratification theory as we know it and we will be talking about that as I said in greater detail in a moment's time. So there are certain assumptions of those theories and there are certain background for users and gratification theory as well. So I'm just summarizing some of it here and we'll come back to that in greater details as I said. So people consume media messages for all sorts of reasons. So it can be for entertainment it can be because you're trying to pass time. It can be because you want to be a part of group because everybody is talking about some media content or something maybe on some OTT platform or whatever. So even you want to you know talk about that so that you will be able to converse in that particular group or whatever. Different people consume media for very very different reasons. Often it is it is also you know a kind of a symbol that you want to portray. Okay I watch Discovery Channel for example. So you watch it and it makes you feel good and you want to send that message across to people that okay he has this sophisticated he or she has that sophisticated taste of consuming media content. So as I said there are very many different reasons we'll try and find out or we'll try and create you know some kind of a list of those reasons. But important to realize that people consume media messages for all sorts of reasons. The effect of that message is unlikely to be the same for everyone it will be different for different people. But the driving mechanism is need gratification that I'm consuming media content directly and deliberately because I want some needs to be satisfied so that I need some need or I want that need gratification that is why or at least that is the mechanism of the theory of users and gratification. So if we understand the particular needs of media consumers then why they consume certain media content and why they do not consume certain media content will be more clear. This is the seminal work that we have to talk about this is in the prestigious public opinion quarterly published in 1973 January. This is the first and the most authoritative research article on users and gratification theory and this is by LHA cards JG Blumler and Michael Gurevich. So some of the things that you're going to talk in today's presentation is based on this work by cards Blumler and Gurevich. One of the important things that they talk about is that the audience is active. Audience is conceived often as an active audience it is not passive and important part of mass media use is goal directed they want to satisfy certain goals they want certain need gratification that is why they are consuming media content. It could be very different it could be entertaining it could be passing time it could be as I said many many different reasons but people actively seek out specific media and specific content to generate specific gratification. So I might be on the internet for for certain specific content so that I need some specific gratification if I want some immediate information then I might be on my mobile phone right now. So this is a very very important assumption or this is a very important backdrop to the users and gratification theory. Why are people regarded as active because they're able to examine and evaluate various types of media for accomplishing various communication goals. And even now when we talk about social media we understand that okay what are the kind of content I would want on Twitter and what do I want it for Facebook and on a closed WhatsApp group it will be different kind of communication or whatever. So our our activity is in you know understanding that all these different media outlets are present and I can accomplish different communication goals through these outlets. Study of media effect must take into account that people deliberately use media for particular purposes and we keep on emphasizing that we'll keep on coming on to that because that is one area where the audience becomes the center of the game. It's not about how how the structure of the media affects people but how people consume that media or how audience is regarded as powerful. So this is as you can understand a very important structure of the audience itself. So users and gratifications are inextricably linked. What users you want to get from media and what gratifications you draw from that they are linked. So I want to use media for this purpose and I get certain gratifications out of that. So this is based on my deliberate choice in using a particular media or not using a particular media. Again another very important thing that these researchers cards Blumler and Kilovich talk is that media is one among the different things or one among the different activities that people can do. You could be playing a video game or you could be reading a book or you could be having your tea or coffee with your friend or you could be hanging out in your locality or whatever. Or you could be consuming media. So media is one of the activities that you decide to participate in. It's not that you know you do not have a choice. So out of all those choices we are consuming that and this is very very important that why would you not be doing all those things but watching a particular TV channel. And that's very important because you want a particular gratification which you think is not available elsewhere. And we will just in a moment's time you know talk in more details about that. So people are aware of their own media use and if we ask them or if we as researchers try and find out from them then they will be very clearly able to tell us that you know what are what is why am I using this particular media and you know what what gratification do I draw out of that. I'm sure you know many of us will be thinking that okay much of it will not be true. When I go back to the weaknesses of this theory I will talk in details about this as well. But this is the assumption that these authors make about users and gratification theory. Another very important as researchers that we should suspend our judgment regarding why people are consuming different content. And I'm sure that we understand that we have this concept of low brow content and high brow content or whatever. But as I said this is dependent on how people view that what you as a low brow is not very important to how people or what gratification do you think that people get out of that. Maybe they identify with certain things or maybe they are getting you know certain kind of gratification which probably we are not aware of. So it should not be based on researchers judgment or the observers judgment but it is based on what audience for themselves things is right for them or what they think is good content for them. Again I will talk about these five different things which lead to our usage of media or you know these kind of things. So I would want you to just consider on these five things little carefully. First is that you know in the present social situation or whenever this was in the 70s and much of it is to even today. It produces a lot of tensions and conflicts and I might add stress and strain as well. So since this is the social structure or the society in which we live it there is the possibility of these tensions and conflicts etc. We need you know some easement of this pressure and that is possible through media consumption. We might be going to face YouTube to watch some old songs or we might be watching MTV beats or whatever just to ease or even some you know Kapil Sharma show or any kind of a comedy or whatever it different people react differently. We will talk about that because maybe there are some people who would find a lot of gratification in a horror show which many others would not even dare to look at it. Or maybe many people would find a political talk show very entertaining where maybe many others would not even you know touch you know go even miles closer to that they would not. So it depends on different people as I keep on emphasizing. Second thing is that our social situations might create some awareness of problems that exist and you know they might be demanding attention about which we will consume media content to know more about those problems. So because we live in a society we know about maybe for example the COVID situation now or maybe climate change or about all these things or any kind of a thing. So we are made aware of these problems that exist and we use media to get some answers to these problems. Another very important thing is that in COVID world of course travel and all that is restricted and even meeting friends and going out to places is restricted. But generally it's very there are not very many real life opportunities for us to say for example just know each and every place about Mumbai for example or maybe the North Cricket ground or maybe North Pole or whatever or any kind of situations. So these are real these real life opportunities are not available to most of us and media can serve as substitutes or supplements to this these real life opportunities. So when we see a particular movie or when we participate in those reality shows or whatever we see ourselves in those situations and we can live the life of the characters there. So that's one social need that media satisfy that it provides us a substitute of all these real life opportunities or even a supplement to these real life opportunities. Again there are other things as I said maybe these social situations they elicit specific values maybe it might make me a lot more for example environmentally conscious. So I will consume those kind of media content which reconfirms my concerns about environmental issues and all such things. So there are certain values that we might find very important very often we go to media to just reinforce those kind of values. One value could be that okay my cricket team is better than everybody else in the world so I would go and watch all the places where my cricket team is doing well. These are as I said very crude examples but again our social situations make us require these kind of things from the media and other things as I said you are expected to be familiar with certain media content. So everybody could be talking about say for example the film on social dilemma so you must be also watching that particular program because everybody is talking about that and you also want to talk about that. So these are some of the things that these social situations lead us to take from media lead us to demand certain uses of media and to draw gratifications from media content. So if I have to provide a typology of these based on the social situations that I spoke of these are the things you could be wanting to just pass time you have lots of time and you want to pass it good enough so you will be just going through channels or through any other media content. I am just talking about television it could be any kind of it could be print media it could be new media it could be film radio whatever companionship okay you are feeling lonely or you want to feel a part of a community or whatever. Media gives you that opportunity it also gives you an opportunity to escape from the reality so we it's a lot stressful and also I just want some escape so that's that's one use gratification that I can draw from media. I want to just enjoy a content so it could be as I said that enjoyment could be very different to for different people some some people would be looking for war movies for example others could be looking for horror and still others would be looking at different kinds of content. This provides us an idea of social interaction so I'm not going able to go to all these local places if a new market or whatever but through media users usage I know or I can you know take that interaction to at least at a mental level or even interact with like minded people on social media for example. Relaxation information excitement these are some of the people typology or these are the some of the users that we can put media to we'll talk about this in a little bit more detail in the next few slides so. So it could be a cognitive need it could be a need cognitive means you know thinking need that I want information I want knowledge I want comprehension so I could be watching television news or I could be reading newspapers or I could be. Reading some website or whatever so that is another kind of a need as I said it could be a cognitive need it could be effective need that I want some kind of an emotional support I want some kind of an emotional or some aesthetic appearance experience as I said. So that is another need type and we might be using certain media content to satisfy those kind of needs so it's not just cognitive and effective there are there are many other kinds of needs that I'll be talking about just here. So it could be personally integrative as I said so I want I want to feel good about myself about my community about my so a lot of these things about identity are also you know related to media users are looking for such kind of content so it's not always what media is offering me I have those choices and I'm using. What what need I need to be gratified at that point of time so it might be cognitive or it might be a combination of these needs. It could be cognitive effective personal integrative social and integrative and tension release as I said you might be just looking for some escape or some diversion. So you want to watch a movie for three hours or you want to watch a comedy show or you want to read these kind of content so on and so forth. So these are various need types and these are some of the description of those need types. So the strength of the users and gratification theories that it focuses attention on individuals individuals are at the center of the mass communication process they get to decide for themselves that what are they going to watch and what gratification. Are they going to get from that kind of a content. It respects intellect and ability of media consumers media as consumers are not regarded as a homogeneous unintelligent people without any any cognitive ability or whatever but so this theory respects that part of media consumers that they have intellect and they have a lot of ability. Or at least even even media literacy wants some media consumers to have this intellect and this ability as we discussed in our last lecture. It also provides analysis into how people experience media content as I said everybody does not experience it differently. There's always the audience side there's one side where the media producer or the content producer would want people to behave in certain ways but there's always a different thing about how people experience it. And even in the age of this digital media and all there's always an element of user experience and there's a huge lot of activity going on how people experience certain media content or how they experience certain sites so on and so forth. It differentiates active users from more passive users. So it's at times I might be just using it passively and at other times I might be using actively so it differentiates this different users it can be different at different times at certain times I might be just a passive user but it does not mean that I'm always a passive user. It studies media as part of an everyday social interaction as we suggested that media is among one of the choices that you make every day you could be doing many other things and it could be instead of doing those things you are choosing to interact with media so this is a part of our everyday social interaction. Why we adopt new media? Why we adopt certain sites? Why do we adopt certain social media applications so on and so forth? So this is because of the users and gratification theory we are able to get an insight into that. There are some weaknesses of course and one major weakness is that it's often mistakenly associated with functionalism. Now functionalist theory is something that we will talk in a later lecture in greater detail about. But functional theory basically suggests that every section of the society has certain very important roles to perform and since they are performing those roles that is why there is order and continuity in the society. So functionalist theory suggests that say for example the police system or the media system or the postal system and all these systems are very important in society and that is why there is order and continuity in the society. But one problem with this functional theory is that it has a bias towards a status quo. It does not allow for change or it does not even bother to talk about changes. So that is one area. It cannot easily address the presence or absence of effects. So it does not talk about the effects, media effects whether they are present or absent. It only talks about what users people make out of it. So one of the weaknesses is it does not talk about this whether the effects are present or absent or to what extent they are there. Many of these key concepts are unmeasurable. Many of these things you know why you are using this or what gratification. These are things that cannot always be measured through scientific tools. So even if you were asking people about how satisfied you are so it could be just some kind of a not a very concrete measurement. People would be suggesting that okay I wanted this for enjoyment but to what level or to what extent that is something that is not possible. It is too oriented towards the micro level. It is too oriented to the individual. It is not talking about the macro level or it is not talking about the structural factors. That is one of the weaknesses of the users and gratifications theory. And media gratifications are often not associated with effects. Gratification is another thing. Effect is another thing. So that distinction is also very important and that distinction is not made in this users and gratification theory. The research areas are these seven. So we can talk about the social and psychological origins of these needs which generate expectations. We can talk about the social and psychological origins of the needs itself. So what are those needs and what are the expectations from mass media and other sources which lead to different patterns of media exposure. Not even different patterns of media exposure but engagement to media. So first of all we decide we are going to consume this content. And second we decide on how much we are going to engage with it. So your engagement could be very superficial at times. So these are as I said just research areas that we talk about. Not very important at that point of stage but these are the areas that can be covered at this level. Now we are going to talk finally about what are the users and gratifications that we can get from Facebook and instant messaging. And this is from an article about a decade ago in the bulletin of science and technology. I will just zoom it to show you where it is from. In the bulletin of science and technology from SAGE. And this is quite a seminal article. It talks about the users and gratifications of social media. So I will just talk about what users and gratifications we can get from social media or what these authors suggest are the gratification that we get from social media. So it could be as they say under the past time section they are talking about these things. To kill time because it is entertaining, because I enjoy it, because it is fun, because it is a pleasant rest, it relaxes me. It gets me away from pressures and responsibilities. It gets me away from what I am doing and to put off something that I should be doing. So these are some of the things that these researchers suggest that people make use of Facebook or instant messaging for. It is also as I said the affection. So this is another need. So they basically talk of these five needs. Past time needs, the affection needs, the fashion needs, problem and sociability and social knowledge. So the affection needs I want to thank people. I want to let people know I care about them, to show others encouragement, to help others, to show others that I am concerned about them. So these are the needs that people use Facebook for. As I said different people can be having very many different reasons for using social media or these kind of things. So this is what these researchers suggest. So I don't want to look old fashioned. I want to look stylish. So I get to know about fashion statements also through usage of social media. I also use it to share my problems, because I need someone to talk to or to be with or I need someone to talk about my problems sometimes. That is why I go to Facebook or I am on instant messaging or to forget about my problems to make friends of the opposite gender to be less inhibited. So these are the uses that we talk about as you can understand that when we talk of users and ratifications theory, we are not only talking about the simple uses that we think might be there. There might be some very complex uses and this is very different for different people. So it's not only about the media trying to influence us in certain ways. It is about what uses I put media to and what gratifications do I get out of those media that I am consuming or the media content that I am consuming. So that ends the presentation.