Lecture 1
Communication Consultancy
• Giving advice using theories, models, concepts
• When did Communication Consultancy start?
1. McQuail —> 19th century or beginning of 20th century —>
start of mass communication with advertising etc.
• Industrialization (everything became more, and everything
started to be bigger, cheaper, more available)
• Rise of nationalism (propaganda)
• Birth of political parties (constantly trying to persuade
people)
• Birth of socialism
• Emancipation of the masses (women emancipation or minor
groups)
• The era of the rise of the media
• World War 1. —> boost in new propaganda methods —>
newspapers, magazines, radio —> investing in propaganda —
> they need attention —> sa they started campaigning (often
aggressive, patriotic messages) —> media campaigning for
war and patriotism —> a motivated patriotic population set
for war
• Campaign = people set out to reach a certain goal and use
mass media to reach this goal
• Companies started to use mass media as well —> many
communication consultancy groups were set up after 1st
world war
2. Antiquity —> Greek “Rhetorica” (first communication
science)
• All about persuasion —> trying to persuade someone with use
of communication
• Romans perfected it
• The first models and theories about communication were
“born” here
Two schools of thought
Dialectic Method
• Discovering the (ultimate) truth —> communication is a way
to find truth
• Discourse
• Logical Argumentation
• Rational Discussion
• Socrates, Plato
,Rhetorica
• Rhetor —> public speaker
• The goal is to persuade someone
• Rhetorica taught the ability to perceive all means of
persuasion in any given scenario
• Sophists (nihilists) —> Did not believed in ultimate truth,
and that truth is so important —> they just wanted to
persuade someone else
• Aristotle, Caesar, Marc Anthony, Octavian, Cicero
Elements in Communication
• Logos - rational ways to approach communication —> use of
arguments, appeal of logic —> the truth plays a very
important role in this
• Ethos - sender of communication —>
trustworthiness, likeability and intelligence of the
sender (Cicero’s De Oratore —> Familiarity with sender)
• Pathos - use of emotional appeals in communication
Mass communication is about channels of communication
• channels of communication = media
• words, voice, visual communication (symbols, logos),
architecture, statues, theatres, written word
Aspects of mass communication
• organized means of openly communicating with an audience
• different channels have different characteristics
• channels are "media"
• different people respond differently to messages
• communication - every act of transmitting information
Consultants
• Everyone who is in a position to give advice, based on
experience or research
• Advice can be based on: Experience
• Primary research - doing research yourself
• Secondary research - based on research by others
Theory research and practice
• Theories tries to explain and predict reality
• It is always an oversimplification of the truth; but a
useful one
• Makes use of hypotheses
• Hypotheses help you formulate an advice —> If...then...
,Methods of research
• Observation
• Experiment
• Survey
• Interview
• Focus Group
• Content Analysis (MCA - manual, ACA - automatic)
• Secondary research
Using theory
The cognitive process
• Intrapersonal communication – having a dialogue inside our
head
• Roots in psychology
• How do we process information?
• Knowledge
• Emotions
• Behavioral actions
Uncertainty reduction theory
a) People live in constant uncertainty
b) People use communication to reduce uncertainty
Three communication strategies to reduce uncertainty
• Passive strategy - observing the world
• Active strategy - asking someone how/what
• Interactive strategy - asking the source of uncertainty
Change and cultural diversity causes much uncertainty in our
lives
• communication consultants are trying to provide us with
social cues on how to behave to fit in
• bombarded by everyday messages stating what to do/not do if
we want to be cool
• fear of not fitting in —> fear of isolation —> we want to
prevent it —> so we follow media acting as “trend-setters”
—> they provide us answers on how to “fit in"
Elaboration Likelihood Model
• Are people motivated and do they have an ability to decode
and process the persuasive message?
• Central path —> Thinking —> Direct rational cues
• Peripheral path —> Social/Appeals in Cues —> Humor, fear,
desire
, • Persuasive attempts should consider:
a) Motivation
b) Ability
• Boomerang effect —> if bombarded with wrong cues and types
of messages
• Using survey to find out if people are motivated and have
the ability to process the information
Cognitive bias
• Subconsciously blocking messages which are not important
• Not seeing a lot of the world because of distractions
• Strategies that make use of this theory —> Subliminal
messaging (hidden cues) and Nudging (non-hidden cues)
Two-Step Flow
• Persuasion through opinion leaders
• Opinion leaders are: media savvy, relatively easy to
approach, open to logical argumentation
Agenda Setting Theory
• Media tell us what to think about (not what to think)
• Who and what is important?
• Why is it important?
• Where do important things happen?
• The main issues of the day brought out by news media
influence what the public perceive as important topics
• Effects are peripheral and short term
• Media agenda influences: Public and Policy agenda
• If the media talks about it, then it must be important
Framing - Second level agenda setting
• Frame of reference, context, theme, news angle
• Selection and salience
• Frames define problems, diagnose causes, make moral
judgements and suggest remedies.
• Framing is a way to give some overall interpretation to
isolated items of fact.
Priming
• Example of framing
• Issues that receive most attention in the media are
important factors for public assessment of politicians
• Issues are often associated with the things on which they
have the strongest reputation.
