EARLY MODELS OF COMMUNICATION

Lasswell’s Communication Model has become the most famous single phrase m communication research – known as the Lasswell Formula

Who? - Artist/Source or Sender
Says What ? – Text
In which channel – Medium
To Whom? - Audience
With what Effect - Society

The formula exhibits/shows a typical trait of the early models। It takes for granted that the communicator has some intention of influencing the receiver and therefore is treated as a persuasive process. It is also presumed that the messages must have effects. Critics are of the view that he did not consider the matter of feedback and is therefore this is a unidirectional formula, that is --one way - from Sender to Receiver only.

Sapir-Whorf hypothesis – According to these two linguists, language is not merely a transparent means of delivering information or messages। Our language is a kind of prism that we use to make sense of the world.It is not a window pane that we can see through without any distortions, and is not a mirror that reflects the world in which we live.It therefore generates the idea that different languages generate different worlds. What we know of society and the world, and what we think about them, is tied to language habits of the group in which we find ourselves.

Play Theory of Mass Communication – William Stephenson suggests that the most significant
Function of mass communication is to facilitate “subjective play” to give people pleasure, an interlude from the pressing matters that concern them most of the time. The functions it serves, according to him, are to provide play, to influence customs, to normalize manners, give people something in common to talk about, so as to encourage mutual socialization. The second function is to shake up society. Mass Communication , has by implication, a very difficult time changing basic beliefs, but it can play a role in shaping our convergent or momentary desires and the relatively unimportant decisions we make। According to Stephenson other theorists have gone wrong because they have given more importance to the persuasive role of COMMUNICATION.