Reevaluating “The End of Mass Communication?”

What is it about?

Over a decade has passed since Chaffee & Metzger first published their intriguing article “The End of Mass Communication?" & suggested that the new media will change the notions of mass communication and, as a result, the theories used in communication research. The present review sets out to reassess Chaffee & Metzger's claim by describing the development of several core theories, namely the Agenda-Setting theory, the notions of media audiences and the Digital Divide, in light of the new media.

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Why is it important?

There have been very few attempts to reassess mass communication concepts in light of the changes introduced by new media technologies (e.g., Lorimer, 2002; Handayani, 2011; Metzger, 2009, 2013; Napoli, 2010). Our scan of the literature revealed hundreds of relevant studies. We preferred to highlight the dominant trends and so to reflect the “state of the art,” thus, the studies represent only a small sample of the entire body of research reviewed for this report (over 450 studies).