Characteristics of Mass Communication

OVERVIEW

ž The Shannon–Weaver model of communication has been called the "mother of all models."Social Scientists use the term to refer to an integrated model of the concepts of information source, message, transmitter, signal, channel, noise,receiver, information destination, probability of error, encoding, decoding,information rate, channel capacity, etc. However, this is misleading, as the related fundamental ideas were developed by Shannon alone. 

Claude Elwood Shannon

ž  In 1948, Shannon was an American mathematician, Electronic engineer and Weaver was an American scientist both of them join together to write an article in “Bell System Technical Journal” called “A Mathematical Theory of Communication” and also called as “Shannon-Weaver model of communication”.

ž  This model is specially designed to develop the effective communication between sender and receiver. Also they find factors which affecting the communication process called “Noise”. At first the model was developed to improve the Technical communication. Later it’s widely applied in the field of Communication.

Warren Weaver:

ž  The article was the founding work of the field of information theory. It was later published in 1949 as a book titled The Mathematical Theory of Communication which was published as a paperback in 1963. The book contains an additional article by Warren Weaver, providing an overview of the theory for a more general audience. Shannon's article laid out the basic elements of communication

SHANNON-WEAVER’S MODEL OF COMMUNICATION

Sender         : The originator of message or the information source selects desire message

Encoder      : The transmitter which converts the message into signals

Decoder      : The reception place of the signal which converts signals into message.   

Receiver      : The destination of the message from sender

Noise       : The messages are transferred from encoder to decoder through channel. During this process the messages may distracted or affected by physical noise like horn sounds, thunder and crowd noise or encoded signals may distract in the channel during the transmission process which affect the communication flow or the receiver may not receive the correct message.

Explanation of Shannon Weaver Model:

The sender encodes the message and sends it to the receiver through a technological channel like telephone and telegraph. The sender converts the message into codes understandable to the machine. The message is sent in codes through a medium. The receiver has to decode the message before understanding it and interpreting it. The receptor machine can also act as a decoder in some cases. The channel can have noise and the receiver might not have the capacity to decode which might cause problems in communication process. 

Here, for instance, brain might be the sender, mouth might be the encoder which encodes to a particular language, air might be the channel, another person’s ear might be the receptor and his brain might be the decoder and receiver. Similarly, air is the channel here, the noise present in his environment that disturbs them is the noise whereas his response is the feedback. There were only 5 components when the model was made. Noise was added later

Practical Example of  Shannon-Weaver model of communication :
Thomson made call to his assistant “come here I want to see you”.  During his call, noise appeared (transmission error) and his assistant received “I want” only. Again Assistant asked Thomson (feedback) “what do you want Thomson”.
Sender 

 :   Thomson
Encoder 

:   Telephone (Thomson)
Channel 

:   Cable
Noise

:   Distraction in voice
Reception

 :   Telephone (Assistant)
Receiver 

:   Assistant
Due to transmission error or noise, Assistant can’t able to understand Thomson’s messages.
The noise which affect the communication flow between them.

COMMUNICATION :
· One of the simplest model and its general applied in various communication theories.

· The model which attracts both academics of Human communication and Information theorist to leads their further research in communication.
· It’s more effective in person-to-person communication than group or mass audience.
· The model based on “Sender and Receiver”. Here sender plays the primary role and receiver plays the secondary role (receive the information or passive).
· Communication is not a one way process. If it’s behaved like that, it will lose its strength. For example: Audience or receiver who listening a radio, reading the books or watching television is a one way communication because absence of feedback.
· Understanding Noise will helps to solve the various problems in communication.
· This model is specially designed to develop the effective communication between sender and receiver. Also they find factors which affecting the communication process called “Noise”. At first the model was developed to improve the Technical communication. Later it’s widely applied in the field of Communication.