Module 1 Lesson

6: Models of
Communication
Prepared by: Ann Catherine Acenas
English Dept, XU
 Aristotle’s
Communication Model

The is the first communication model. It is a liner model with

three elements: speaker, message and listener. The speaker
has wide knowledge and human understanding; desirable
traits; vocal quality; command of language and has physical
appearance in the communicative situation. Meantime,
there are two basic expectations from the listener:
1. the right to expect interesting ideas;
2. the speaker should talk to them.
Finally, the message, which is made up of ideas and feelings, is
shared if they are represented by symbols which can be
Verbal or Non-verbal.
Other elements to
consider in
Aristotle’s
Communication
Model
The Occasion

1. The length of speech

2. The time of day

3. Size of the room and audience

4. Facilities and environment

5. The nature of the meeting

 The SMCR or Berlo’s
Model (David Berlo)

David Berlo. In 1960, David Berlo expanded on Shannon

and Weaver’s (1949) linear model of communication and
created the SMCR Model of Communication. The Sender-
Message-Channel-Receiver Model of communication
separated the model into clear parts and has been
expanded upon by other scholars.
 Source Messag Channel Receive
(S) e (M) (C) r (R)
Communicatio Element Seeing Communicatio
n Skills n Skills

Structure Hearing
Knowledg Knowledg
e e
Content Touching
Attitudes Attitudes
Treatment Smelling
Social Social
Code Tasting
System System

Culture Culture
 Schramm’s Model

Schramm. Communication is usually described along a few

major dimensions: Message (what type of things are
communicated), source / emisor / sender / encoder (by whom),
form (in which form), channel (through which medium),
destination / receiver / target /decoder (to whom), and Receiver.
Wilbur Schramm (1954) also indicated that we should also
examine the impact that a message has (both desired and
undesired) on the target of the message. Between parties,
communication includes acts that confer knowledge and
experiences, give advice and commands, and ask questions.
These acts may take many forms, in one of the various manners
of communication. The form depends on the abilities of the group
communicating.
Together, communication content and form
make messages that are sent towards a destination. The
target can be oneself, another person or being, another
entity (such as a corporation or group of beings).
Communication can be seen as processes of information
transmission governed by three levels of semiotic rules:
Syntactic (formal properties of signs and symbols),
Pragmatic (concerned with the relations between
signs/expressions and their users) and Semantic (study of
relationships between signs and symbols and what they
represent).
Therefore, communication is social interaction where at least
two interacting agents share a common set of signs and a
common set of semiotic rules. This commonly held rule in
some sense ignores autocommunication,
including intrapersonal communication via diaries or self-talk,
both secondary phenomena that followed the primary
acquisition of communicative competences within social
interactions.
Lasswell
Model
Harold Lasswell is a political
scientist and a communication
theorist whose main concern was
with mass communcation and
propaganda.
He was interested in studying the
use of propaganda communication
through the media during the
Second World War; he began with
the principle that “mass
communication is something that
does something to another person”
Three functions for
communication

Surveillance of the
environment
Correlation of components
of society
Cultural transmission
between generation
 1) Surveillance of the Environment: An important
function of the media is to keep up a surveillance of all the
happenings in the world and provide information to the
human society. The media has the responsibility of providing
news and cover a wide variety of issues that is of some
service to the society. Media help maintain social order by
providing instructions on what has to be done in times of
crisis, thereby reducing confusion among the masses.
 Example: In times of natural disasters, war, health scares,
etc., it is the role of the media to create awareness by
providing information on what is happening and of ways in
which the disaster can be faced.
 2) Correlation of parts of Society: This function relates
to how the media’s selection of certain news and its
interpretation affects how society understands and responds
to it. People’s attitudes towards political issues, events,
public policy, etc. are influenced to an extent by how the
media frames and presents the issue in their discussions
and presentations.
 Example: The media’s reporting on the war in Vietnam
played a role in changing the mindsets of Americans who
started opposing sending soldiers to fight a losing war. Hitler
used the media in his propaganda war against the Jews.
 3) Cultural Transmission: This refers to the ability of the
media to teach the various norms, rules and values that
exist in a society and ensure its transfer from one
generation to the next. Television programmes by and large
reflects the society in which they are broadcast and promote
the understanding of a society’s cultural heritage.
Children’s television programmes are designed to showcase
good behaviors and moral standards which children can
learn by watching.
Lasswell model suggests the message flow in a
multicultural society with multiple audiences. The flow of
message is through various channels. And also this
communication model is similar to Aristotle’s
communication model.

In fact, the Lasswell’s Formula consists of five major

components as illustrated in the figure below:
The Lasswell Formula
“A convenient way to describe an act of
communication is to answer the following
questions…”

SAYS IN WHAT TO WITH

WHO? CHANNEL? WHOM? WHAT
WHAT?
EFFECT
?
Control Analysis

Content Analysis

Medium Analysis

Audience Analysis

Effects Analysis
Control Analysis This element of communication has to be studied
through “control analysis”. It investigates things such as:
-Which company owns a certain TV channel or newspaper?
-What is its ideology? Its aims?
Content analysis is associated to stereotyping and
representation of different groups politically. It is also related
to the purpose or the ulterior motives of the message. charge
counting the number of occurrences of a particular representation of
concrete persons or situations in the media and comparing that with some
kind of objective measure like official statistics.
Media analysis represents which medium should be used to
exercise maximum power against the receivers. It is the medium by
which the message is being communicated/ transmitted or what carries the
message. Messages can be sent in channels corresponding to humans’ five
senses. ” investigates the choice of the suitable channel or medium , among
other possibilities, to use to carry a particular message, depending on the
content, the purpose of the message, the target audience, etc. It asks questions
such as:
-Is the medium appropriate to the message/audience?
-Can it explain what we want to explain?
E.g: Advertising agencies decide what is the most appropriate magazine,
newspaper or TV channel to reach their audience.
Audience analysis shows who are the target population to be
manipulated or brain-washed. ” attempts to know everything about the
target public of a given message, from gender and age to social status and
tastes. The mass media find it crucial to know as much as possible about their
audiences

Effect analysis is done before the process starts. It is used to

predict the effect of message over the target population to be
exploited. It endeavours to know whether the media (mass communication)
have any effect or not, if so, how they affect their audiences.
 Advantage of Disadvantage
Lasswell model: of Lasswell
model:

Easy and Simple Feedback not

mentioned
It suits for almost
all types of Noise not mentioned
communication

The concept of Linear Model

effect
Shannon-Weaver’s
Mathematical Model

Claude Shannon Warren Weaver

Mathematical Theory of Communication

Another viewpoint on communication is offered by Shannon and

Weaver (1949). This model is focused on information theory, and
in particular the transmission and reception of messages. The
model introduces three elements not found in Aristotle’s model:
a transmitter, a receiver, and sources of noise. In
telecommunications the transmitter and receiver would be the
hardware used by the sender and receiver during the act of
communication. Noise may come from static sources (like solar
flares),
unusual weather conditions, or electron equipment that
interferes with the signal.
Although at first glance, this model seems to be geared
strictly for telecommunications such as radio and television,
some of the elements may easily generalize into other
fields of interest. Consider that in any face-to-face situation,
there may be environmental or other sources of noise that
interfere with the communication.
Shannon and Weaver. The original model was designed
to mirror the functioning of radio and telephone
technologies. Their initial model consisted of three primary
parts: sender, channel, and receiver. The sender was the
part of a telephone a person spoke into, the channel was
the telephone itself, and the receiver was the part of the
phone where one could hear the other person. Shannon
and Weaver also recognized that often there is static that
interferes with one listening to a telephone conversation,
which they deemed noise.
The noise could also mean the absence of signal. In a simple
model, often referred to as the transmission model or standard
view of communication, information or content (e.g. a message
in natural language) is sent in some form (as spoken language)
from an emisor/ sender/ encoder to a destination/
receiver/ decoder. This common conception of communication
views communication as a means of sending and receiving
information. The strengths of this model are simplicity,
generality, and quantifiability.
Social scientists Claude Shannon and Warren Weaver structured
this model based on the following elements: An information
source, which produces a message. A transmitter, which
encodes the message into signals. A channel, to which signals
are adapted for transmission. A receiver, which 'decodes'
(reconstructs) the message from the signal. A destination,
where the message arrives. Shannon and Weaver argued that
there were three levels of problems for communication within
this theory. The technical problem: how accurately can the
message be transmitted?
The semantic problem: how precisely is the meaning
'conveyed'? The effectiveness problem: how effectively does
the received meaning affect behavior? Daniel Chandler critiques
the transmission model by stating: It assumes communicators
are isolated individuals. No allowance for differing purposes. No
allowance for differing interpretations. No allowance for unequal
power relations. No allowance for situational contexts.
“I like
you” “I l***
you”

FEEDBACK
 Disadvantage of
Advantage of Shannon-
Shannon-Weaver Weaver model:
model:

One of the Feedback is taken as

simplest less important in
model comparison to the
Effective in person messages sent by
to person the sender

Communication Not effective for

is not a one mass
way process communication
White’s Model
Symbolizin
g
Thinking Expressing

Transmittin
Monitoring
g

Feedbacking Receiving

Decoding
 Proponent: Eugene E. White
Eugene E. White was born in 1933. He is an African
Americanartist from Ozan, Arkansas.
 According to Eugene White, communication is a repetitive cycle.
 His 1960 model shows that communication is a cyclical
process composed of eight stages. These stages are
thinking, symbolizing, expressing, transmitting, receiving,
decoding, feed-backing, monitoring and thinking.
 This model suggests that there is no beginning nor end to
communication.
 Although White’s model recognizes the interaction of the sender and
the receiver of the message, it fails to consider the active role of the
receiver of the message in the process.
Points for discussion:

 1. What is the strength of each of these

models in terms of showing how the
communication process works?
 2. What is the weakness of each model?
Write your answers to the discussion in Word file using the format
below. Submit with file name: FAMILY NAME-Communication
Model

Model Strength Weakness

1. Aristotle

2.

3.
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