Theory: Audience

In this essay I will be looking at how audience theories apply to my group's media horror trailer. Audience theories are about how the audience takes consumes a media context and how they understand it.  There are two types of audience, mass audience which is where everyone reacts the same way and can influence people and active audience who as individuals can interpretation media in different ways.

 Cultivation theory is a representation of a passive audience it’s about how media can affect people’s sense of reality. For example if someone watches a lot of slasher horror films then then they might feel there’s a lot more violence towards teenagers in the world and a lot of psychopathic killers. There is evidence to prove this theory by a study that compared heavy, moderate and light media users, where they found heavy media users have ‘mean world syndrome’. In the summer trailer my group did you don’t see any violence just teenagers looking around an abandoned building, this therefore means that from watching the trailer, audiences can’t really change how they view the world. The trailer is therefore unsuccessful as it's lack of violence doesn't depict what the meaning is suppose to be, which is teen punishment. In the trailer we will be doing we could show more typical conventions of a slasher so that when people watch it they can associate it with other ones they’ve seen and make their own judgement. Such as how the world can be violent or how there's serial killers out there trying to kill teenagers. To make the new trailer effective we could use clothing to symbolise different characters for example the final girl could wear white which connotes innocence and another character could wear red symbolising blood and evil. 

Another theory that can be applied to horror trailers is the Catharsis theory, where the audience uses the media to help them as it can purge or cleanse negative emotions. This would be an example of an active audience, this theory is not necessarily bad as it allows an audience to watch a horror film that may be violent but instead of seeing it as something like what the copycat theory suggest they use it to purge their own aggression making them less aggressive. We could have improved are horror trailer by including more action and violence so that the audience doesn’t feel like they’ve wasted there time and that they get something from watching it. As the lack of violence suggest the trailer didn't fulfil it's purpose.

A theory that can be applied to our trailer is the hypodermic needle. This is where a message is injected into the media which would be are horror trailer and they are passive towards it. It can be applied to our trailer as it’s about a group of teenagers trespassing in an abandoned building and then something comes to attack them. This relates to are trailer as it shows the audience that actions have consequences and that they shouldn’t do something like that or there’s a chance something bad could happen to them.

 Denis Mcquail’s uses and gratification theory can also be applied to our trailer. With the tension free explanation that states that some audience use media to escape their own lives and to relive tension. When watching our horror trailer the audience can escape their lives which may be boring or sad and be concentrated and involved in the lives of the teenagers who are doing stupid things. As they want the thrill of someone else life or made up reality to make there's feel less boring.  However in the trailer we will be making we could utilise more of the uses and gratification theory so that more people can relate to it. For example the effective needs (personal identity), as it’s a slasher we will be making there are common conventions of personality type with the jock, explorer and the final girl. The use of these characters would mean a wider range of audience’s can relate to them and they can satisfy their emotional needs. The use of mis en scene could also appeal to the audience for example using props like chainsaws, and knives so that they get a feeling of tension as these won't be everyday objects that they see people being chased with and killed.

Another passive audience theory is the copycat theory which states that an audience can copy what media they see and that it can effect and influence them. A strength of this theory is that it can play off the fears of people, for example parents start actively monitoring what their children watch. If an audience watches are trailer they might get an idea they hadn’t had before, to go and explore a abandoned building. However they could be stopped by someone who hasn’t watched the trailer. However not everyone can be monitored for what they watch and if someone watches a very explicit violent horror they might want to do the same thing. 

Overall we could have used more of the audience theories that will help with the audience relate to the trailer and also how they react to it. In the trailer we do next we will need to take into consideration how to effectively put them in the trailer. Specifically uses and gratification, the effects model and the hypodermic model as these theories are about the actions and attitudes audience can have towards media.