Blumler and Katz – Uses and Gratifications

 Adapted from Denis McQuail’s Audience Pleasures, this active audience theory states we consume media for the following uses and gratifications:

•Information and Education – the viewer wants to acquire information, knowledge and understanding by watching programmes like The News or Documentaries.

•Entertainment – Viewers watch programmes for enjoyment.

•Personal Identity - Viewers can recognise a person or product, role models that reflect similar values to themselves and mimic or copy some of their characteristics.

•Integration and social interaction – the ability for media products to produce a topic of conversation between people. For example who is the best contestant on The X-factor who which was the best goal shown on Match of the day.

•Escapism – Computer games and action films let viewers escape their real lives and imagine themselves in those situations.