Audience Response Research Articles

Azerbaijani TV Viewers' Practices of Watching Turkish Television Programs In The Context of Cultural Studies: Turkish Culture And Tourism

The aim of present study is to explore the reception processes of Azerbaijani viewers’ of television channels broadcasting from Turkey within the framework of Cultural Studies pertaining to Turkish culture and tourism. Employing the audience-centered reception approach within the tradition of Cultural Studies, this study examines the reception patterns exhibited by participants residing in diverse cities in Azerbaijan who watch Turkish television programs. Four separate focus group interviews involving a total of 36 participants were conducted to investigate the dominant, negotiated, and oppositional styles of perception prevalent in audience reception research, thereby gathering data on the interpretive practices and reception behaviors of Azerbaijani viewers regarding the content they consume. The findings were thematically synthesized to elucidate the viewers’ reception styles. Consequently, the research indicates that diverse television content is interpreted by the audience through various reception frameworks concerning Turkish culture and tourism incentives. It was observed that Azerbaijani viewers, watch a broad spectrum of Turkish television programs, engage in understanding Turkish culture, with the majority of participants demonstrating a propensity towards dominant interpretations.

An Experimental Study on Viewing Perception and Gratification of Danmu Subtitled Online Video Streaming

With the surge of participatory culture and dynamic of media convergence, danmu have experienced their continued proliferation on East Asian online streaming. Facilitated by pseudo-synchronicity and congruency technologies, existing research has focused on describing and conceptualising the final product of danmu rather than being grounded in the empirical process of receiving danmu. We know little of how audiences perceive danmu and to what extent danmu affect viewers’ gratifications. Adopting an online-based experiment, this study contributes to examining viewers’ engagement with and gratifications from different types of danmu. It attempts to understand what types of danmu matter to the audience’s viewing gratifications in terms of its content and multimodality, and what (dis)connections can be observed between the audience reception of danmu and conventional subtitles. The results show that extra cultural information danmu stand out as the most gratifying type, significantly satisfying viewers’ utilitarian and hedonic needs for information and entertainment seeking. Scrolling speed and size are the two most influential multimodal factors in viewers’ gratifications with danmu. However, the potential connections between conventional subtitles and danmu depend highly on a video's content or genre.

Performance as cultural text: defamiliarizing the performing art tradition of Purulia Chhau

Referring to the social and cultural anthropological perspectives and employing a qualitative approach as the primary methodological tool, this PhD dissertation explores the performing art tradition of Chhau in Purulia, West Bengal, as a cultural/performance text. According to Richard Schechner (2006), the performance process as a time-space sequence consists of (1) proto-performance – training, workshop, and rehearsal; (2) performance – warm-up, public performance, events/contexts sustaining the public performance, and cool down; and (3) aftermath – critical responses, archives, and memories. Conflating these three-phase performance sequences, first, the dissertation finds out the correlation between dance habits and restored behavior and analyzes the proto-performance practices of Purulia Chhau. Second, it analyzes the connection between the performative cultures of Chaitra Parva and Purulia Chhau and establishes a synthesis among ritual, performance, and spirituality. It also understands the core performance gist of Purulia Chhau, deriving from the cultures of orality, performativity, and make-believe/make-belief. Third, the dissertation critically looks at the various performance aftermaths such as audience reception, critical responses, archives, memories, new normalization, and women’s innovations that take place in Purulia Chhau.

Enabling touch in an art museum: A curatorial reflection

In 2016 the National Museum in Oslo launched a nationwide touring exhibition that allowed visitors for the first time to touch the sculptures of modernist Aase Texmon Rygh. The aim was to encourage visitors to experience these abstract stone works through the body before engaging with various contextualising practices for a more comprehensive process of meaning-making. Allowing members of the public to touch original sculpture in an exhibition context was new not only for the National Museum but also internationally, and the exhibition generated considerable professional and media attention. In my role as the exhibition’s curator, I set out to investigate the interdisciplinary process of developing the exhibition concept and the audience response through a practice-led research project. Drawing on different theoretical perspectives, such as learning theory and interdisciplinary sensory research, and audience surveys which were conducted during the exhibition, I wanted to learn more about how audiences experienced touching the sculptures, and how touch affected their process of meaning making. In this paper, I share some of my findings and also reflect on the importance of practitioners doing research on their own practice.

How verbal text guides the interpretation of advertisement images: a predictive typology of verbal anchoring

Abstract One of the key functions of verbal text in modern advertising is to anchor (i.e., constrain) the meaning of the accompanying image, thereby leading the audience toward a preferred interpretation. However, despite the importance of verbal anchoring, there is limited understanding of the various forms it can take and the related effects on audience responses. To address this gap, we propose a new typology that distinguishes verbal anchoring based on the underlying sense-giving strategy and degree of completeness. We then delineate a set of empirically testable predictions on how these verbal anchoring types may influence information processing and subsequent persuasion. The article concludes by discussing the contributions of the typology to communication research and by suggesting new avenues for future studies.

STRATEGIC USE OF EROTIC CAPITAL IN CHALLENGING PATRIARCHY: THE CASE OF KURIYEDATH THATRI AND ITS CINEMATIC REPRESENTATION IN PARINAYAM

The article examines the concept of erotic capital and its use by women to fight against the patriarchal system, with a focus on the historical figure, Kuriyedath Thatri (also called Thatrikutty) from the Namboodiri community in Kerala. The study aims to understand Thatrikutty’s strategic deployment of erotic capital, which marked an end to the chastity trial of smarthavicharam within the community. Additionally, it critiques the 1994 Malayalam movie Parinayam, which is based on Thatrikutty’s life, for its lack of portrayal of erotic capital. Employing a qualitative analysis, the study begins with an overview of the condition of Namboodiri women and the concept of smarthavicharam. It then delves into how Thatrikutty used her erotic capital as a weapon against the oppressive system. Subsequently, the article shifts focus to the movie Parinayam, detailing the film’s failure to depict erotic capital. The findings reveal how women can use erotic capital as a powerful weapon to challenge patriarchal oppressions, as exemplified by Thatrikutty’s actions. The study also finds out that the lack of portrayal of erotic capital in the movie Parinayam, accounts to the attempt to suit the movie to societal thoughts, concerning the response of a wide audience.

Improving the understandability of flood warning messages – Explorative study on design preferences

Early warning systems (EWS) are effective if they prevent loss of lives, injuries and structural damage. Optimization of EWS is often focused on technical aspects such as the dissemination of warnings. Since the audience's response is key for the effectiveness of an EWS, non-technical aspects that improve perception and understandability of warning messages deserve attention, too. German warning messages have been criticized, particularly after fatal and destructive floods in July 2021, as being insufficient and not understandable. Data from an exploratory online survey in Germany (n = 131) reveal insights on preferences in flood warning message (FWM) design. The survey focused on structural appearance of recommendations on action and on graphic support like maps, symbols and photos. Respondents showed clear preferences of including graphics into FWMs (96 %) and structuring recommendations on action in a bullet point format (85 %). Maps were the most favored among the offered graphic options, as they offer visual information on e.g., intensity and extent of inundation. Display of real time flood maps is often not feasible yet, but flood hazard maps are available in Germany and could be integrated into future FWM as an intermediate solution.

Ave Maria out of context: prosody, poetry or piety?

ABSTRACT Focusing on singability and audience reception, this is a case study on Duy ey sevgili sesimi! ‘Hear, o beloved, my voice’, a Turkish version of Schubert’s Ellens Gesang III (D. 839; Opus 52, No. 6). The study provides a data-driven discussion on the reception of this version by the primary text user, i.e. the performer, the secondary text users, i.e. the listeners, and a first-hand account of the intentions behind the choices of the target song lyricist. The data provide evidence for a hierarchical understanding of Johan Franzon’s three layers of singability: prosodic, poetic, and semantic-reflexive. However, the hierarchical ordering of the layers depends on the priorities of each user group. The performer has focused on the musical aspects of the song rather than the target text itself. Listeners with no background in music or translation have prioritized the semantic-reflexive layer. Listeners with a background in translation studies have paid attention to the poetic and semantic-reflexive layers. In contrast, those listeners with musical training or a special interest in music have regarded the lyrics as subordinate to the original composition, standing aloof from the translation of a classical song. Such diverging views point towards a more fine-grained understanding of singability.

SUBTITLING MALAY TABOO LANGUAGE INTO ENGLISH: THE CASE OF THE ASSISTANT (2022)

Taboo refers to social and behavioural proscriptions which may instigate discomfort in society, both in language use and psychical behaviour. In audiovisual translation, the emphasis on taboo is often placed on its relative audience reception and the enforcement of relevant laws and regulations. Akin to the nature of audiovisual products, subtitling taboo references also warrants multimodal consideration, especially in relation to both verbal and nonverbal elements. This study, in particular, aims to probe into the taboo language of subtitling from Malay into English. The film The Assistant (2022), which was released on the online streaming platform Netflix, is selected as the corpus. To this end, a parallel corpus was developed and subsequently analysed using AntConc and AntPConc. Frequency, thematic and translation strategy patterns were mapped and descriptively analysed. In general terms, the analysis reveals that the taboo words in the source text are multifaceted, predominantly exclamatory, and markedly explicit. Many of the taboo loads are also found to be equally rendered into the target text, which corresponds to Netflix’s no-censorship policy. The study also learns the omission of some references in the translation, which can be partly linked to the technical and structural constraints of subtitling.

Exploring the empathic potential of 360-degree documentary

ABSTRACT This paper provides an exploration of the creative and ethical challenges that emerged from producing a 360-degree documentary demo, focusing on two Greek drag artists who live in Athens. It introduces a new approach to understanding empathy at the level of practice and from the perspective of audiences, combining the production of the demo with a reflexive analysis of audience responses to the demo. Emphasis is placed on the potential of 360-degree documentary to develop emotional and cognitive empathy. The demo aimed to capture the drag artists’ performance as a form of resistance, using an innovative technology to portray this under-represented community. A reflexive methodology was deployed for analysing the data, which were collected in the form of 360-degree video and focus groups with participants experiencing the demo. The findings of this study provide insights into the possibility of 360-degree documentary to create change. During the production of the demo, moments of perspective-taking between the researcher and the documentary subjects were rare. The focus groups pointed to aspects which also hindered the empathic potential of the demo, including the diverging expectations of participants and the levels of participants’ familiarity with this technology.

News Innovation Under Rapid Political Change: Influence of State-Society Relations, Organizational Culture, and Critical Events

ABSTRACT Extant discussions of news media innovation have largely focused on the impact of media technologies, market forces, and audience reception. This article examines how political dynamics in transitional societies shape news media innovation. It argues that, in such contexts, news media innovation can be understood as a contingent outcome driven by changing state-society relations, mediated by organizational factors, and punctuated by critical political events. The empirical analysis focuses on Hong Kong between the year 2012 and 2022. Based on in-depth interviews with 30 journalists from online and mainstream media organizations, this article illustrates how increasing pressure on press freedom and the growth of political contention inadvertently fed into the growth of online media, though the degree of innovation exhibited by specific outlets was influenced by organizational culture. Significant political events reconfigured media innovation by bringing about unexpected market support and major shifts in the state’s media control strategies. General theoretical implications are discussed.

A COMPOSITIONAL EXPLORATION OF THE HORROR ELEMENTS IN THE SHINING, DRACULA AND THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

The horror genre has captivated audiences across various media, eliciting a range of emotions through its skillful manipulation of compositional elements. This research paper explores the intricate tapestry of narrative structure, character development, atmospheric construction, and thematic exploration that shape the horror experience. By employing a mixed-methods approach, integrating qualitative textual and visual analysis with quantitative data on audience responses, this study delves into the intricate dynamics of intermedial adaptation. Through a comprehensive examination of renowned literary horror works and their cinematic counterparts, including "The Shining" by Stephen King, "Dracula" by Bram Stoker, and "The Haunting of Hill House" by Shirley Jackson, this research unveils the creative strategies employed by writers and filmmakers to evoke fear, suspense, and thrill. The quantitative analysis provides empirical evidence of audience engagement and emotional resonance, while the qualitative exploration unravels the nuanced compositional elements and adaptation techniques. By synthesizing these complementary perspectives, this study contributes to a deeper understanding of the horror experience across media platforms, offering valuable insights for artists, scholars, and audiences alike. Ultimately, this research underscores the enduring cultural significance of horror narratives and their potential to provoke meaningful discourse while captivating generations to come.

Exploring social media as an apparatus for audience engineering in the Nigerian theatre milieu

This study investigates the use of social media as an apparatus for audience engineering in the Nigerian theatre milieu. This interrogation becomes vital as live theatre in Nigeria continues to struggle to maintain clientele due to decreasing audience response. Using the mixed-method approach, this paper explores engaging social media channels (Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp and Tiktok) in select experimental productions - Ifure Ufford-Azorbo’s Beyond my Scars, staged in the Model Theatre Studio (MTS) at the University of Uyo, Daniel Kpodoh’s interpretation of Ola Rotimi’s The Gods are not to Blame presented at The Arena in Port Harcourt and VickyBon Uzuazor’s Diary of a Pastor’s Wife staged in Akwa Ibom State University Pinnacle Theatre. This study is underpinned by the Technology Acceptance Model, Diffusion of Innovation and Social Media Engagement Theory in its framework. In its findings, the use of social media increases the reach of the production information to prospective audiences and also enhances the reach of theatrical presentations through live feeds; therefore, social media has proven capable of attracting new audiences for wider reception of the theatre product. This suggests that social media has become a useful apparatus for audience engineering in Nigerian theatre, enabling practitioners to leverage online platforms to shape audience engagement, build community, extend conversations and promote artistic works to reach wider audiences. The study contributes to our understanding that; social media technology is a supportive performance apparatus of connectedness and is potent in influencing and transforming the theatrical landscape in Nigeria and beyond through audience engineering. This paper therefore recommends the creative and consistent use of social media platforms as standard production protocol for the reinvigoration of the theatre milieu, especially in Nigeria.

Youth Reception of Gender-Based Violence Victim in Soft White Underbelly YouTube Channel

Soft White Underbelly is a YouTube channel that produces content of interviews with marginalized people in America. It uncovers stories of stigmatized people and reveals the systemic inequality behind their presence. Gender-based violence (GBV) is one of the issues addressed on this channel. It portrays how prostitutes are victims of GBV. The author applied Stuart Hall’s audience reception theory. The theory proposes that media messages are not static. Hall suggested that expectations and prior knowledge influence their text interpretation. This research investigates how young audiences perceive portrayals of GBV victims in Soft White Underbelly's videos on prostitution and explores the factors that influence these perceptions. A qualitative method was adopted, employing audience reception analysis as the approach. Informants were international YouTube users between the ages of 18 and 30. The study finds various receptions, influenced by social factors, media habits, educational levels, personal experiences, and economic factors. Furthermore, this research confirms that Hall's reception theory is evident in today's audience reception. The findings demonstrate how viewers can develop critical awareness, interpret media texts, and disseminate them back into their social environment.

Arabic Learning Strategies Through Tiktok Entertainment Content to Attract Interest in Learning Arabic

TikTok content is increasingly in demand by young people in Indonesia. Based on We Are Social data, Indonesia was recorded as the country with the second largest TikTok users in the world in January 2024, namely 109.90 million users with the majority being school-age children. Thus, this platform has the potential to be utilized as an innovative and modern medium for learning Arabic. This study aims to explore strategies for learning Arabic through TikTok in attracting interest in the language using descriptive qualitative observation techniques. The researcher conducted an in-depth analysis of the learning content and the audience's response through the comments column. The results of this research indicate that strategies for learning Arabic through TikTok that collaborate with the latest trends followed by young people can attract students' interest in learning. The recommendation is that learning Arabic through TikTok engages audiences and provides a dynamic and modern learning environment.

Audience Reception: Exploring Collective Spectatorship in the Film ‘Dunki’

Audience Reception: Exploring Collective Spectatorship in the Film ‘Dunki’

“The Story of You and Me”: Strategic Ambiguity in the Paratextual Reception of Kim Ji-Young, Born 1982

ABSTRACT This article explores the connection between the online commentary on the South Korean novel, and later film, Kim Ji-Young, Born 1982 (2016; film released in 2019), and the perception of feminism within South Korea. To capture how Kim Ji-Young’s “meaning” is entangled with popular beliefs about feminism, I analyze audience reception through Kim Ji-Young’s paratexts: (a) tweets and (b) comments responding to newspaper articles mentioning the novel and/or film Kim Ji-Young from the Korean platform Naver. I examine paratexts to reveal that the “meaning” Kim Ji-Young has in online spaces is not determined solely by the novel or film-as-referent. I show that Kim Ji-Young the source text has become inextricable from the mélange of preconceptions regarding what constitutes a “feminist” stance in Korea, ranging from the stereotype of the selfish “feminist” who shirks her maternal duty towards the nation to the discontent of stay-at-home moms. I show that online misogyny has forced those who support Kim Ji-Young’s feminist message to employ what rhetorician Leah Ceccarelli describes as “strategic ambiguity.” This involves simultaneously disavowing Kim Ji-Young‘s feminism while praising the text’s feminist politics, a tactic used to shield themselves from attacks by misogynistic trolls.

Word-of-mouth among blood service employees who also donate blood: a qualitative investigation of advantages and challenges for dual-role donors

BackgroundDespite word-of-mouth (WOM) and electronic WOM (eWOM) influencing people’s willingness to donate blood, no research has explored this behavior among blood service employees who are also donors. This underexplored segment is highly important, as they are generally committed to both the organization and the cause and are likely more informed on the topic of blood donation than the average donor.MethodsThis study comprised six online focus groups with 26 Australian Red Cross Lifeblood employees who are also donors. Questions covered a range of blood donation and WOM topics, including when they became blood donors, if they had engaged in WOM about blood donation, what they had talked about and with whom, and what were audience reactions. Thematic analysis was then used to explore how responses related to the employees’ motivations, opportunities, and abilities to engage in WOM and eWOM about blood donation.ResultsWhile most employee-donors saw alignment in their employee and donor roles, advocating for blood donation was not considered a necessary part of either role. Educating others about blood donation was a common goal of employee-donor WOM and eWOM, and almost all employees engaged in reactive WOM, triggered by events (e.g., recent donations) or questions about their work. Employee-donors in donor-facing roles (e.g., communications and collections staff) felt more aware of the importance of encouraging others to donate blood and were also more likely to be proactive in their WOM activity. Along with these perceived advantages of having a dual role, employee-donors also identified some disadvantages, such as unrealistic expertise expectations and negative audience responses that can be difficult to navigate.ConclusionsBeing an employee-donor is a double-edged sword. For example, increased opportunities to talk about blood donation and access to more information can be offset by having to respond to more challenging questions/comments and expectations, while appropriately representing their employer. More research is needed among those in employee-donor roles within the healthcare and/or non-profit sectors, to determine whether these are issues faced more broadly, and how those in dual roles can be most effectively supported to engage in positive WOM and eWOM.

Identification of Storynomics Tourism in the Production of an Animation “Barley Manusia Ikan" and its Audience Reception (Experimental Study on Tourism Communication Strategy for Super Priority Destinations)

Identification of Storynomics Tourism in the Production of an Animation “Barley Manusia Ikan" and its Audience Reception (Experimental Study on Tourism Communication Strategy for Super Priority Destinations)

Recuperative Wokeness: Nike and the Commodification of Potential for Social Change

Faced with the increasingly politicized nature of sport and the need for resource accumulation under neoliberal capitalism, brands employ political stances to connect with consumers and expand customer bases. The ubiquity of social media in the present moment offers a unique opportunity to analyze corporate messaging and also audience response. Seven hundred and fifty YouTube comments from three Nike ads were coded. Overall commenters responded positively to Nike acting as a “representative” for progressivism in sport while failing to acknowledge larger social movements or Nike’s own questionable business practices. Using Debord’s theory of spectacle and Fisher’s capitalist realism, we discuss “recuperative wokeness,” our term for how these narratives serve to co-opt activism, and how this works to maintain the legitimacy of neoliberal market system.