Concept
Mass communication
Overview
Mass communication is the process of communicating and exchanging information through mass media to large population segments. It utilizes various forms of media as technology has made the dissemination of information more efficient. Primary examples of platforms utilized and examined include journalism and advertising. Mass communication, unlike interpersonal communication and organizational communication, focuses on particular resources transmitting information to numerous receivers. The study of mass communication is chiefly concerned with how the content and information that is being mass communicated persuades or affects the behavior, attitude, opinion, or emotion of people receiving the information.
Narrowly, mass communication is the transmission of messages to many recipients at a time. However, mass communication can be broadly understood as the process of extensive circulation of information within regions and across the globe.
From a critical perspective, mass communication has been interpreted as an omnipresent medium that transcends conventional sender-receiver paradigms. The philosopher Peter Sloterdijk posits that it operates not merely as a unidirectional transmission from source to recipient, but rather as an immersive environment or "atmosphere" permeating societal existence. This environment, he argues, is involuntarily absorbed—akin to a respiratory act—through necessities of existence, thereby shaping collective consciousness and lived experience.
Through mass communication, information can be transmitted quickly to many people who do not necessarily live near the source. Mass communication is practiced through various channels known as mediums, which include radio, television, social networking, billboards, newspapers, magazines, books, film, and the Internet. In this modern era, mass communication is used to disperse information at an accelerated rate, often regarding politics and other polarizing topics. There are major connections between the media that is consumed through mass communication and our culture, which contributes to polarization and dividing people based on consequential issues. mass communication is a one way communication process
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Possible passages
Found by search and not yet checked by a person; they may only mention the idea in passing.
Whenever this is done, what is now sensible may be called a "sign" or "symbol," and that of which it is intended to call up the "idea" may be called its "meaning." This is a rough outline of what constitutes "meaning." But we must fill in the outline in various ways. And, since we are concerned with what is called "thought," we must pay more attention than we otherwise should do to the private as opposed to the…
Bertrand Russell, The Analysis of Mind
States what Mass communication is.
But even to-day we still listen with our muscles, we even read with our muscles. Every mature art possesses a host of conventions as a basis: in so far as it is a language. Convention is a condition of great art, _not_ an obstacle to it.... Every elevation of life likewise elevates the power of communication, as also the understanding of man. _The power of living in other people's souls_ originally had nothing to do…
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, The Will to Power
States what Mass communication is.
He denies absolutely the existence of innate faculties. The mind is simply endowed with the power of producing various qualities in reaction to the various realities which act upon it. These qualitatively different reactions are called presentations (Vorstellungen). Every presentation once called into being persists; it may be driven below the "threshold" of consciousness by new and stronger presentations, produced…
John Dewey, Democracy and Education
States what Mass communication is.
Philosophers who discussed Mass communication
Related ideas
- Belief
- Emotion
- Internet
- Ethnography
- Journalism
- Sociology
- Information
- Film
- Semiotics
- PBS
- Thomas Edison
- Attitude (psychology)
- Qualitative research
- Quantitative research
- Behavior
- Humanism
- Communication
- Camera
- France
Place in the tradition
Part of Will Durant.