Mass Communication In Society

Mass communication has now become very important in our modern world. Sometimes we do not even realize that what we use, see or touch are part of the mass communication world. Essentially, almost everyone in this universe is part of the mass communication society as well. Why and how? The things that we talk about on a daily basis comes from mass media such as a song from the radio, a TV program from the television or even a news article from the newspaper. Such forms of mass media are meant to inform and deliver messages across a group of people. Now that we know that mass communication and mass media revolves around us, there are many different functions and uses of it in the society that we fail to realize. In this essay, we will discuss

It is also known as socialization function. This kind of transmission has its way of subconsciously forming a certain behavior, attitudes, cultural norms or rules of a person. It is often argued that increased and facilitated access to media use and media content enables the individual to form identity in a more informed, responsible and critically aware manner (Fornas & Xinaris, 2013). The transmission of values can fall under good or bad values. As such, it also helps to create a society with common social values. For instance, a group of young children from the age of 9-12 years old might mimic a singer’s character because they idolized him or her. Imagine if the singer carries a bad character such as being disrespectful towards elderly and uses profanity? Subsequently, these children would mimic the behavior of this singer as they grow up. Yes, no doubt these children will have something in common, which is idolizing the singer, but they carry with them bad values that has been portrayed by the singer. Once a value is transmitted via the mass media, there is a long-term change in values and this is the issue of how values get transmitted over generations (St. Clair & A. Busch, 2000). This leads to the next point which is most of the time viewers do not have the full ability to differentiate good and bad values that is projected by the mass media. A lot of these are projected from music, television, film, reality shows and most importantly the social media as well. When the mass media projects something for the audiences, it creates an image of portrayal for the eyes of society to “follow”. Example, fashion trends, body movements or gestures and style of communication. Social media has been rather influential these days. According to Ohiagu & Okorie (2014) social media have also become embedded in our everyday lives that they largely fashion our perceptions,