Models

 

n 1948, Shannon was an American mathematician, Electronic engineer and Weaver was an American scientist both of them join together to write an article a rticle in “Bell System Technical Journal” called “A Mathematical Theory of Communication” and also called as “Shannon“ShannonWeaver model of communication”.  communication”.  This model is specially designed to develop the effective communication between sender and receiver. Also they find factors which affecting the communication process called “Noise”. At first the model was developed to improve the Technical communication. Later it‟s widely applied in the field of Communication. The model deals with various concepts like Information source, transmitter, Noise, channel, message, receiver, channel, information destination, encode and decode.

Sender : The originator of message or the information source selects desire message. Encoder : The transmitter which converts the message into signals. Note: The sender‟s messages converted into signals like waves or Binary data which is

compactable to transmit the messages through cables or satellites. For example: In telephone the voice is converted into wave signals and it transmits through cables. Decoder : The reception place of the signal which converts signals into message. A reverse process of encode. Note : The receiver converts those binary data or waves into message which is comfortable and understandable for receiver. Otherwise receiver can‟t receive the exact message and it will affect the effective communication between sender and receiver. Receiver : The destination of the message from sender. Note : Based on the decoded message the receiver gives their feed back to sender. If the message distracted by noise it will affect the communication flow between sender and receiver.

 

Noise: The messages are transferred from encoder to decoder through channel. During this process the messages may distracted or affected by physical noise like horn sounds, thunder and crowd noise or encoded signals may distract in the channel during the transmission process which affect the communication flow or the receiver may not receive the correct message. Note : The model is clearly deals with external noises only which affect the messages or signals from external sources. For example: If there is any problems occur in network which directly

affect the mobile phone communication or distract the messages. Practical Example of Shannon-Weaver model of communication :

Thomson made call to his assistant “come here I want to see you”. During his call, noise appeared (transmission error) and his assistant received “I want” only. Again Assistant asked Thomson (feedback) “what do you want Thomson”.  Thomson”.  Sender

: Thomson

Encoder

: Telephone (Thomson)

Channel

: Cable

Noise

: Distraction in voice

Reception : Telephone (Assistant) Receiver

: Assistant.

Due to transmission error or noise, Assistant can‟t able to understand Thomson‟s messages.  messages.   *The noise which affect the communication flow between them. Criticism of Shannon-Weaver model of communication :

1. One of the simplest model and its general applied in various communication theories. 2. The model which attracts both academics of Human communication and Information theorist to leads their further research in communication. 3. It‟s more effective in person-to-person person -to-person communication than group or mass audience. 4. The model based on “Sender and Receiver”. Here sender plays the primary role and receiver plays the secondary role (receive the information or passive). 5. Communication is not a one way process. If it‟s behaved like that, it will lose its strength. For example: Audience or receiver who listening a radio, reading the books or watching television is a one way communication because absence of feedback. 6. Understanding Noise will helps to solve the various problems in communication.

 

This is the very basic model for communication. Shannon and weaver identified this model in 1949. SMCR stands for:    

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Source Message Channel Receiver

Source : Message :

Creator of the message or from whom the message is sent. The actual content or idea for the communication.

Channel : The medium through which communication taking place, so that the message can be conveyed from one place to another. Receiver : The individual or group or the person who finally receives the message.

SMCR model describes the exchange of information and the model can be applied to all forms of  communication.

 

Harold Dwight Lasswell (February 13, 1902  —  December 18, 1978)

Harold Dwight Lasswell, the American political scientist states that a convenient way to describe an act of communication is to answer the following questions  

Who

 

Says What

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In Which Channel

 

To Whom

 

With what effect?

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This model is about process of communication and its function to society, According to Lasswell there are three functions for communication: 1.  Surveillance of the environment 2.  Correlation of components of society 3.  Cultural transmission between generation Lasswell model suggests the message flow in a multicultural society with multiple audiences. The flow of message is through various channels. And also this communication model is similar to Aristotle‟s communication model.  model.  In this model, the communication communica tion component who refers the research area called “Control Analysis”,   Analysis”, Says what is refers to “Content Analysis”,  Analysis”,   In which channel is refers to “Media Analysis”, Anal ysis”,   To Whom is refers to “Audience Analysis”  Analysis”   With What Effect is refers to “Effect Analysis”  Analysis”  Example: 

CNN NEWS –  NEWS –  A water leak from Japan‟s tsunami-crippled tsunami-crippled nuclear power station resulted in about 100 times the permitted level of radioactive material flowing into the sea, operator Tokyo Electric Power Co said on Saturday. Who –  Who  – TEPC TEPC Operator What –  What Radioactive material flowing into sea  – Radioactive Channel –  Channel CNN NEWS (Television medium)  – CNN Whom –  Whom  – Public Public Effect –  Effect  – Alert Alert the people of japan from the radiation. Advantage of lasswell model:      

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It is Easy and Simple It suits for almost all types of communication The concept of effect

Disadvantage of lasswell model:

 

     

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Feedback not mentioned Noise not mentioned Linear Model

OSGOOD- SCHRAMM MODEL OF COMMUNICATION in in  Communication Models  Models 

It is a Circular Model, so that communication is something circular in nature Who does encoding or Sends the message (message originates) Encoder –   – Who Decoder – Who  – Who receives the message Interpreter  – Person – Person trying to understand (analyses, perceive) or interpret Note: From the message starting to ending, there is an interpretation goes on. Based on this interpretation only the message is received.

This model breaks the sender and receiver model it seems communication in a practical way. It is not a traditional model. It can happen within our self or two people; each person acts as both sender and receiver and hence use interpretation. It is simultaneously take place e.g. encoding, interpret and decoding.

 

Semantic noise is a concept introduced here it occurs when sender and receiver apply different meaning to the same message. It happens mostly because of words and phrases for e.g. Technical Language, So certain words and phrases will cause you to deviate from the actual meaning of the communication. Note: When semantic noise takes place decoding and interpretation becomes difficult and people get deviated from the actual message. Advantage of Osgood- Schramm model of communication  1.  2.  3.  4.  5. 

Dynamic model- Shows how a situation can change It shows why redundancy is an essential part There is no separate sender and receiver, sender and receiver is the same person Assume communication to be circular in nature Feedback – Feedback  – central feature.

Disadvantage of Osgood- Schramm model of communication 

This model does not talk about semantic noise and it assume the moment of encoding and decoding.

THEODORE M.NEWCOMB (July 24, 1903) in Rock Creek, at the northeastern tip of Ohio Ohio and he was a great pioneer in the field of social psychology. Merely 50 years he worked for the improvement of human motivation, perception and learning to shape the deep understanding of  social process. In 1929, he started his professional career in the department of psychology at University of Michigan. In 1931, he moved to Cleveland College, University of Western Reserve from University of Michigan. In 1934, he got a great offer from New Bennington College in Vermont which caused remarkable changes in his rest of his professional career. His works “Personality and Social Change” (1943), Psychology” (1950). He itpublished a new social approach in field of communication which“Social is called “ABX” system (later became Newcomb‟s model) and it‟s published in the name of “An Approach to the Stud Study y of Communicative Acts (1953)”. He published another great work in the field of social psychology called “The Acquaintance Process” (1961).  (1961). 

 

  The New Comb‟s model of communication co mmunication was introduced by Theodore M Newcomb of the University of Michigan in 1953. He gives different approach to the communication process. The main purpose of this theory is to introduce the role of communication in a social relationship (society) and to maintain social equilibrium within the social system. He does not include the message as a separate entity in his diagram, implying it only by use of directional arrows. He concentrates on the social purpose of communication, showing all communication as a means of  sustaining relationships between people. Sometimes it‟s called as an “ABX” model of  communication.

-B-X system The Newcomb‟s model works in a triangular format or A A-B-X A – Sender  – Sender

 

B – Receiver  – Receiver X – Matter  – Matter of Concern The relationship between A and B is like student and teacher, government and public or newspaper and readers. Sender and Receiver may work in a same flow but the same time some factor like “X” may affect their flow of relationship.  relationship.   “X” it may be third persons, issue, topic or  policy. For Example:

Teachers introduce a new policy to increase the college timing from 6 hours to 8 hours. A – Teachers B – Students Students X –  X – Policy Policy or issue  – Teachers B –  If both students and teachers are satisfied with this policy then the communication maintains its equilibrium status between them. Otherwise the flow of communication between “A” and “B”  becomes trouble in the social system. If “A” or “B” is not ready to accept the policy then it will directly affect the social system and can‟t maintain the equilibrium status. So Teachers”A” can convince students “B” as much as possible. Otherwise they have to make some adjustments in the Policy “X” and convince them towards the policy.  policy. 

The Gatekeeping Model [2]

Lewin identified several parts of the gatekeeping process in his 1943 article. article.  1) Information moves step by step through channels. The number of channels varies and the amount of time in each channel can vary. 2) Information must pass a “gate” to move from one channel to the next, such that 3) Forces govern channels. There may be opposing psychological forces causing conflict which creates resistance to movement through the channel. Further, 4) There may be several channels that lead to the same end result. And 5) Different actors may control the channels and act as gatekeepers at different times. More than fifty years after White‟s Mr. Gates study, in 2001, Shoemaker, Eichholz, Kim, and [8] Wrigley studied the forces in news gatekeeping in relation to coverage of Congressional bills. bills.   More specifically, they were interested in two hypotheses: 1) the routine gatekeeping force of  assessing a bill‟s newsworthiness will be related to how prominently a bill is covered. And An d 2) the individual journalist forces (education, political ideology, work experience, ethnicity, gender, voting behavior) will be related to how prominently a bill is covered. They also predicted that the newsworthiness of a bill would be more important than journalist s‟ personal characteristics. Surveying both journalists (for their personal characteristics) and editors (for evaluating newsworthiness, Shoemaker and her colleagues found that only newsworthiness had a significant effect the amount of coveragewould givenbe to more a bill,important thus their than first hypothesis was supported as well as the on idea that newsworthiness personal characteristics.

 

  While Shoemaker et al.‟s study focused on traditional news rooms, Singer has been interested in how gatekeeping translates to how traditional newspapers use online tools. tools.[9] [10] In both the 2000 and 2004 Presidential elections, she studied how the Internet was changing the process for newspapers, contending that, “the power powe r of gatekeepers seems to diminish in a modern information society. The Internet defies the th e whole notion of a „gate‟ and challenges the idea that [10]  journalists (or anyone else) can or should limit what passes through it” it”  (p. 265). In the study of the 2004 coverage, Singer posed the following research questions: 1) What did editors of Web sites affiliated with major newspapers see as their goals and their most noteworthy achievements in covering the 2004 political campaign and election? 2) To what extent did these editors relinquish their gatekeeping role by providing opportunities for users to provide or personalize content? And more broadly, 3) In what ways have the views of editors of Web sites affiliated with major newspapers changed since 2000?

Singer found that the content which appears in online editions of newspapers mostly comes from content that appears in the print versions. However, editors were also very proud of the interactive tools on their websites that could not be in the paper. The goal of most editors was after all to inform the public. Further, journalists were beginning to take a step back from their traditional gatekeeping role such that many websites had sections in which journalists provided baseline information and users could manipulate according to their needs and interests like interactive maps,  maps, Electoral College  College scenarios, and ballot building tools based on zip codes. In 2000, editors were likely to boast about how quickly they could publish returns on election night. In 2004, this was no longer the case, as it was standard practice by then. Further, their stated goal for the 2008 election cycle was to let the audience guide the coverage.

[edit] edit] Toward a Theory of Network Gatekeeping Barzilai-Nahon has written a number of contemporary pieces on gatekeeping theories between disciplines..[1] [11] [12] In 2008, she proposed a new way of looking at gatekeeping, merging the disciplines disciplines‟ of communication, information science, and a nd management perspectives into a refined theory of gatekeeping. Traditional mass communication gatekeeping theory has focused on how we get news, however Barzilai- Nahon‟s  Nahon‟s approach applies to all information. Barzilai-Nahon Barzilai-Nahon also [11] adds new terms and redefines old terms in the framework (pp. 1496-1497)    –  “entrance to or exit from a network or its sections.”  sections.”  Gate – Gate information as it moves through a gate. Activities Gatekeeping –  “the process of controlling information Gatekeeping – include among others, selection, addition, withholding, withholding, display, channeling, shaping, manipulation, repetition, timing, localization, integration, disregard, and delection of  information.”  information.”  Gated – Gated  –  “the entity subjected to gatekeeping”  gatekeeping”  c arry out the process of  Gatekeeping mechanism mechanism - “a tool, technology, or methodology used to carry gatekeeping”  gatekeeping” 

 

 –  “an entity (people, organizations, or governments) that has the discretion Network gatekeeper gatekeeper – to exercise gatekeeping through a gatekeeping mechanism in networks and can choose the extent to which to exercise exe rcise it contingent upon the gated standing.” standing.”  

This updated look at gatekeeping also poses a number of classifications including the bases for gatekeeping, mechanisms used in network gatekeeping, and types of authority of network  gatekeepers. Additionally, Barzilai-Nahon introduces a typology for the gated. gated .[11] According to her approach, the gated can have four key attributes at different levels that determine how they can interact with the gate. These are 1) Political power in relation to the gatekeeper, 2) Information production ability, 3) Relationship with the gatekeeper, and 4) Alternatives in the context of  gatekeeping (p. 1501). A typology of combinations of these characteristics then allows for evaluation of potential interactions between the gatekeeper and the gated based on the number and type of attributes an individual has.

Gatekeeping regulate the flow of information History and Orientation 

Kurt Lewin was apparently the first one to use the term "gatekeeping," which he used to describe a wife or mother as the person who decides which foods end up on the family's dinner table. (Lewin, 1947). The gatekeeper is the person who decides what shall pass through each gate section, of which, in any process, there are several. Although he applied it originally to the food chain, he then added that the gating process can include a news item winding through communication channels in a group. This is the point from which most gatekeeper studies in communication are launched. White (1961) was the person who seized upon Lewin's comments and turned it solidly toward journalism in 1950. In the 1970s McCombs and Shaw took a different direction when they looked at the effects of gatekeepers' decisions. They found the audience learns how much importance to attach to a news item from the emphasis the media place on it. McCombs and Shaw pointed out that the gatekeeping concept is related to the newer concept, agenda-setting. (McCombs et al, 1976). The gatekeeper concept is now 50 years old and has slipped into the language of many disciplines, including gatekeeping in organizations. Core Assumptions and Statements 

The gatekeeper decides which information will go forward, and which will not. In other words a gatekeeper in a social system decides which of a certain commodity –  commodity  – materials, materials, goods, and information –  information  – may may enter the system. Important to realize is that gatekeepers are able to control the public‟s knowledge of the actual events by letting some stories pass through the system but bu t keeping others out. Gatekeepers can also be seen as institutions or organizations. In a political system there are gatekeepers, or and institutions control access to positions of  power and regulate the flow ofindividuals information politicalwhich influence. Gatekeepers exist in many

 

 jobs, and their their choices choices hold the potential potential to color color mental mental pictures that are subsequently subsequently created in  people‟s understanding of what is happening in the world around them. Media gatekeeping showed that decision making is based on principles of news values, organizational routines, input structure and common sense. Gatekeeping is vital in communication planning and almost al communication planning roles include some aspect of gatekeeping. The gatekeeper‟s choices are a complex complex web of influences, preferences, motives and common values. Gatekeeping is inevitable and in some circumstances it can be useful. Gatekeeping can also be dangerous, since it can lead to an abuse of power by deciding what information to discard and what to let pass. Nevertheless, gatekeeping is often a routine, guided by some set of standard questions. Conceptual Model 

Source: White (1964) Related to gatekeeping in media. For gatekeeping in organizations this model is not recommended. Favorite Methods 

Interviews, surveys, networkanalysis. Scope and Application 

This theory is related to the mass media and organizations. In the mass media the focus is on the organizational structure of newsrooms and events. Gatekeeping is also an important in organizations, since employees and management are using ways of influence. Example 

A wire service editor decides alone what news audiences will receive from another continent. The idea is that if the gatekeeper‟s gatekeep er‟s selections are biased, the readers‟ understanding will wil l therefore be a little biased. See Wenig for example on gatekeeping in organizations.