INFLUENCE OF THE MASS MEDIA ON DEVELOPMENTÂ (A STUDY OF INI LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA)
CHAPTER ONE
1.0Â INTRODUCTION
1.1Â BACKGROUND OF THE STUDYÂ Â
Mass media are channels used in transmitting information in some way or shape to a large heterogeneous audience simultaneously.
According to et al Kinacid and Schloeder 1992. They consider a scenario in which we turn our radio station and receives nothing but a static noise, and then look outside the window and sees no vendor tune to a television station without anything, thus indicating that the world has come to an end. Mass media gives us relevant information about the public, mass media alert us on daily happenings in the society.
This scenario captures the importance of mass media in contemporary societies. The essence of mass media as effective communication is to capture the audience mind and institutional channels to large public irrespective of geographical location or sociological barriers. The effective communication can no longer rely on lunch alone to capture and hold the attention of the public. The increasing number of media and the audience as well as their complexities in taste and sophistication resulting from exposure of education serve as unavoidable factors in respect of how mass media message are being consumed. Information dies on the way if it does not get through right channel and as such that information will not be effective.
The logical implication of this as Agee et al (1976) note is that the channel through which a massage is transmitted is related to the effectiveness of the message.
A renowned political scientist and media scholar, Harold Lasswel (1948) defines communication as the process of who says what in what channel, to whom and with what effect. He analyzes the process in terms of function such as surveillance of the environment and transiting of cultural heritage from one generation to the other.
In order for mass media to fulfill this function such as disseminating information that are of interest to the public, they need to depend on the interplay of social economic forces within a given community, nation or society. Mass media create awareness to government about particular issues that affect the nation.
Mass media is a significant force in mediated culture, where media reflects and creates the culture. The society in general receives information through billboards, magazines, television and radio. Mass media has a significant impact on our lives and behaviour and this is due to modern technologies and inventors. Because of the importance of mass media people gain knowledge as a result they rely on them for information.
Mass media are a powerful means that do not only influence the world but also shape the society, they perform essential task to cast effect on the audience and maintain society
1.2Â Statement of the Problem
Ini Local Government to borrow the word of one time governor of Akwa Ibom State, Late Obong Akpan Isemin, is massively rural and massively poor. It does appear that he has being consigned to perpetual backwaters of illiteracy, poverty and underdevelopment. Yet a concerted effort must be made to ensure that the states of things change for the better mass media are considered as part of the overall mechanism for this change. In this background it is pertinent to know if the populace of the local government has access to the mass media, what mass media do, do they have access to what their mass media consumption pattern is, the
