Understanding Audiences by Robert Wicks

Understanding Audiences by Robert Wicks

Fully updated for a second edition, Understanding Audiences helps students recognize the crucial role that media plays in their lives and ways in which they can use it constructively.

Robert H. Wicks, David Atkin and Carolyn A. Lin consider the relationship between the producers and the receivers of media information, focusing on how messages shape perceptions of social reality. They analyse how contemporary media vie for the attention of the audience members and evaluate the importance of message structure and content in attracting and maintaining the attention of audiences. This fully updated and revised edition explores new business models - including social media influencers, IP licensing, non-industry content creation - as well as emerging technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), and their impact on an evolving media environment. The book promotes the development of media literacy skills and helps readers to understand the processes associated with engaging them in media messages. It also offers them tools to apply toward the shaping of media in a socially constructive way.

This book is ideal for reading for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students who need to understand the evolving nature of the media and how to best use it.

Robert H. Wicks is Professor Emeritus of Communication at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, USA. He specializes in mass communication theory and research, and his work focuses on human information processing and how audiences use traditional and new media. His books include Understanding Audiences (2001) and From Legacy Media to Going Viral (2024).

David J. Atkin is Professor of Communication at the University of Connecticut, USA. His research focuses on media technology, political communication, and digital media. His books include Communication Technology and Society (2002), The Televiewing Audience (1st and 2nd editions) (2011), Communication Technology and Social Change (2007), and Audience Genre Expectations in the Age of Digital Media (2022).

Carolyn A. Lin is Professor of Communication at the University of Connecticut, USA. She researches how digital media technology and communication impact the audience in advertising, media, health, and environmental contexts. Her books include Communication Technology and Society (2002), Communication Technology and Social Change (2007), and Television Dramas and the Global Village (2021).