Key term
AQA A-Level Media Studies 7572
Media Language
Topic overviewCodes and conventionsConstructing meaning through media languageGenre, hybridity and intertextualityViewpoints, ideology and audience interpretationSemiotics: signs and their typesSemiotics: paradigm, syntagm and anchorageBarthes: denotation, connotation and mythNarratology: narrative codes and diegesisTodorov: equilibrium, disruption and new equilibriumGenre theory as summarised by NealeStructuralism: binary oppositions and mythemesStructuralism: ideological reading and deconstructionPostmodernism: pastiche, bricolage and implosionBaudrillard: simulacra, simulation and hyperreality
Media Representation
Topic overviewConstructing representationsWhy producers make the representational choices they doSocial and cultural context in representationStereotypes: positive and negative useUnder-representation and misrepresentationRepresentation, realism and the values it carriesIndustry contexts and representational choiceDiscourse, ideology and audience positioningTheories of representation: stereotypes and countertypesTheories of representation: misrepresentation and selective representationTheories of representation: ideology, hegemony and constructed realityHall on representation: encoding and decodingTheories of identity as summarised by GauntlettFeminist theories: the male gaze and patriarchyFeminist theories: van Zoonen and hooksTheories of gender performativityTheories around ethnicity and postcolonial theory
Media Industries
Topic overviewProduction, distribution and circulationOwnership and controlEconomics and funding of media industriesMarketing and maintaining audiencesRegulation of media in the UKDigital convergence and the individual producerRegulation in global production and circulationCurran and Seaton: regulation, deregulation and the free marketCurran and Seaton: concentration, conglomerates and public service broadcastingCurran and Seaton: neo-liberalism, surveillance and privacyCurran and Seaton: the central argumentLivingstone and Lunt: the public sphere and governanceLivingstone and Lunt: media literacyLivingstone and Lunt: power, value and globalisationCultural industries as summarised by Hesmondhalgh
Media Audiences
Topic overviewGrouping and categorising audiencesTargeting, attracting, reaching and addressing audiencesMedia technologies and patterns of consumptionMass and specialised audiencesNiche and fan audiencesAudience interpretation and its circumstancesMedia effects: uses and gratificationsMedia effects: hypodermic needle and moral panicMedia effects: media literacyBandura: social learning and imitationCultivation theory: socialisation and the bardic functionGerbner: cultivation differential, mainstreaming and resonanceReception theory: agenda setting, framing and myth makingHall on reception: the three reading positionsFandom'End of audience' theories
Contexts of the Media
Media Forms and Products
Media Audiences
- 16 subtopics
- 38 things to know
- Media One and Media Two
What Media Audiences covers
Media audiences is examined on both Media One and Media Two. It covers how audiences are grouped, targeted and reached, how technology has changed consumption, and the enabling theories: media effects, Bandura, Gerbner on cultivation, reception theory, fandom and the 'end of audience' argument.
Where it is assessed
Media One and Media Two
Both written papers examine the whole theoretical framework.
Check the AQA specification ↗The 16 subtopics
Each one has its own page.
- Grouping and categorising audiencesDemographic, psychographic and behavioural categorisation, target audiences, and the limits of demographics.Open →
- Targeting, attracting, reaching and addressing audiencesThe difference between reaching and attracting, mode of address, marketing, distribution and circulation, and constructing an audience.Open →
- Media technologies and patterns of consumptionOn-demand access, binge viewing, time-shifting, second screening, algorithmic recommendation, filter bubbles and paywalls.Open →
- Mass and specialised audiencesWhy the mass audience mattered to broadcasting, the long tail, and what scale still offers producers.Open →
- Niche and fan audiencesFandom, cult texts, conventions, why fans are valuable beyond their spending, and the risk of depending on them.Open →
- Audience interpretation and its circumstancesWhy interpretations differ, cultural capital, active involvement in production, and the social, cultural and historical circumstances behind response.Open →
- Media effects: uses and gratificationsBlumler and Katz, the four needs, how the theory reverses the effects question, and the criticism that it assumes self-knowledge.Open →
- Media effects: hypodermic needle and moral panicThe hypodermic model and why it is rejected, Cohen on moral panics, folk devils, deviance amplification and cumulation.Open →
- Media effects: media literacyWhat a media literate audience asks of a source, misinformation against disinformation, lateral reading, and the limits of literacy alone.Open →
- Bandura: social learning and imitationSocial learning and imitation, the conditions that make imitation likely, the four stages, and the Bobo doll experiments with their critics.Open →
- Cultivation theory: socialisation and the bardic functionSocialisation, standardisation, enculturation and the bardic function, and why cultivation looks at long-term exposure.Open →
- Gerbner: cultivation differential, mainstreaming and resonanceCultivation differential, mainstreaming, resonance, and what the Mean World Index measures.Open →
- Reception theory: agenda setting, framing and myth makingAgenda setting, framing, myth making, and how conditions of consumption shape meaning.Open →
- Hall on reception: the three reading positionsEncoding and decoding, and the dominant-hegemonic, negotiated and oppositional positions with worked examples.Open →
- FandomProsumers, interactivity, and Jenkins on participatory culture and textual poaching.Open →
- 'End of audience' theoriesDigital natives, 'we the media', Web 2.0, convergence, and Shirky on mass amateurisation and cognitive surplus.Open →
What you need to know
Answer each one before you reveal it.
Your recallNot started
Process
What do producers do to build an audience?
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What does it mean to say media constructs its audience?
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How has on-demand access changed consumption?
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How do recommendation algorithms shape consumption?
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What is the difference between mass and specialised audiences?
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What is the long tail in media distribution?
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Why are fan audiences significant to media industries?
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What is cultural capital?
Process
How does cultural capital affect the way audiences use media?
Process
How do social circumstances affect audience interpretations of media?
Process
How do cultural circumstances influence audience interpretations?
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What four needs does uses and gratifications identify?
Evaluation
What does uses and gratifications claim about audiences?
Who and when
Which researchers developed uses and gratifications theory?
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What is the hypodermic needle model?
Process
How does a moral panic develop?
Who and when
Which theorist established the concept of the moral panic?
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What is cumulation as a media effects concept?
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What does a media literate audience ask about a source?
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How does misinformation differ from disinformation?
Who and when
What does Bandura's social learning theory propose?
Process
What are the four stages of Bandura's social learning process?
Study
What did the Bobo doll experiments show?
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What does cultivation theory propose?
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What is the bardic function of media?
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How do socialisation and enculturation differ in cultivation theory?
Who and when
What are Gerbner's four key concepts?
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What does the Mean World Index measure?
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What is agenda setting?
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What is framing?
Who and when
What three reading positions did Stuart Hall identify?
Process
What is Hall's encoding and decoding model?
Who and when
What three concepts is Henry Jenkins associated with?
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What is a prosumer?
Who and when
What two concepts did Clay Shirky develop?
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What do 'end of audience' theories argue?
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What is Web 2.0?
Take Media Audiences further
The same content, four other ways.
Commonly confused
Pairs that lose marks when they are blurred together.
Hypodermic needle model vs Uses and gratifications
Hypodermic needle model: messages absorbed directly and uncritically by a passive audience. Uses and gratifications: audiences actively selecting media to satisfy their own needs.
Mainstreaming vs Resonance
Mainstreaming: heavy viewing converging worldviews across different social backgrounds. Resonance: effects amplified when content matches the viewer's lived experience.
Negotiated reading vs Oppositional reading
Negotiated reading: partly accepting the preferred meaning while adapting it to personal context. Oppositional reading: understanding the preferred meaning but rejecting it entirely.
Questions from this topic
Each one with the model answer underneath.
- 1
Name one demographic factor used by media industries to categorise audiences.
Model answer
Age.
- 2
How do media industries use gender as a demographic factor when categorising audiences?
Model answer
They group audiences according to whether they identify as male, female or other genders, allowing content to be tailored to gender-specific interests or experiences.
- 3
Why might media industries categorise audiences by social class?
Model answer
Different social classes may have different spending power, cultural interests and media consumption habits, allowing producers to create content that appeals to specific class demographics.
- 4
What is lifestyle as a psychographic factor in audience categorisation?
Model answer
Lifestyle refers to the way people live, including their activities, interests and opinions, which media industries use to group audiences with similar ways of living.
- 5
How does taste function as a psychographic factor for categorising audiences?
Model answer
Taste refers to audience preferences for particular styles, genres or cultural products, allowing media industries to group audiences who share similar aesthetic preferences.
- 6
Define demographic categorisation in the context of media audiences.
Model answer
Demographic categorisation refers to grouping audiences by measurable population characteristics such as age, gender and social class.
What is inside Levo
Six ways to work the same material.
Media Audiences revision questions
- What does Media Audiences cover in AQA A-Level Media Studies?
- 16 subtopics: grouping and categorising audiences, targeting, attracting, reaching and addressing audiences, media technologies and patterns of consumption, mass and specialised audiences, niche and fan audiences, audience interpretation and its circumstances, media effects: uses and gratifications, media effects: hypodermic needle and moral panic, media effects: media literacy, bandura: social learning and imitation, cultivation theory: socialisation and the bardic function, gerbner: cultivation differential, mainstreaming and resonance, reception theory: agenda setting, framing and myth making, hall on reception: the three reading positions, fandom and 'end of audience' theories. Each one has its own page with questions and model answers.
- How is Media Audiences organised?
- By the AQA 7572 specification, subtopic by subtopic, so it matches the order you are taught it in.
Every question in Media Audiences, on a schedule.
Attempt a question from memory, write the correct version, then attempt it again. Levo records the jump between your first attempt and your last, and brings each question back on the day you are due to forget it.
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