Onderzoeksartikel

Culturele indicatoren: een literatuurstudie rond een paradigmawisseling

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Abstract

Gerbner’s cultivation theory developed out of the care that existed around the reality character of the film and later television, and the worry about the large amount of violence that could be found in entertainment. But the theory as such is more than that. It combines content analysis and audience analysis, in that it assumes that television is, to the heavy viewer, a synthetic symbolic, man-made environment. In McLuhan’s words, the environment is wat you do not see, but it influences you neverthelesss. TV-reality is to the heavy viewer what the arctic reality is to the Eskimo. Television is today’s storyteller, and cultivates attitudes and behavior. Such cultivation is quite different from the ‘normal science’ stimulus-response effects. Whether the cultivation theory is applicable at all, or more especially in other countries than the USA should be studied, but starting from the assumptions that are underlying it as it is. Many critics first translate concepts from this theory into the old stimulus-response effects, and overlook the fact that cultural indicators approach is a quite new way of looking at things, and can be considered as a new paradigm.

How to Cite:

Stappers, J., (1993) “Culturele indicatoren: een literatuurstudie rond een paradigmawisseling”, Massacommunicatie : Wetenschappelijk Kwartaaltijdschrift voor Communicatie en Informatie 21(2), 82–101.