Bandura’s theory suggests that individuals learn by observing other, imitating behaviours and receiving reinforcement like punishment for theory actions. Putting this is the context of media audiences, he believes that media portrayals can influence the audience’s behaviour by providing them with models to imitate. Bandura’s view is different from Shirky and Jenkins view of media audiences because Shirky and Jenkins argue that media audiences don’t just passively absorb the media they are consuming but they rather actively share and remix it in complex ways. In conclusion, they all achnolage the active role of audiences engaging with media, but they differ in how they do it. 

1. The video game industry is continuing to grow and grow due to high engagement, leading to large financial returns for investors (this can be seen with the developer Take-Two having a 60% share price increase in 12 months).

2. Esports is the phrase used for competitions based around video games, usually multiplayer ones. They offer monetary prizes for those that win against other teams. The competitions themselves pull in higher numbers of viewers than some mainstream sport events.

3. New technological developments have meant that consumers can get games through digital stores and can play games on their mobile phones as opposed to buying a console. Additionally, cloud gaming allows consumers to play games without actually downloading anything, through the form of streaming.

4. FPS = First Person Shooter (a game centred on gun combat where the players see things from the POV of the characters) MMORPG = massively multiplayer online role-playing game (any story-driven online video game in which a player, taking on the persona of a character in a virtual or fantasy world, interacts with other players)

Bandura stated that the media can implant ideas directly into the minds of the audience, and that they are likely to mimic what they consume.

Jenkins, on the other hand, believes that audiences see themselves as participants in relation to media consumption, and can have conversations about or challenge what they see, and can make media themselves as opposed to simply consuming it.

Shirky stated that there is no longer any such thing as a passive audiences, hence the rise in popularity of the internet. Because the internet can hold conversations around different types of media through the likes of social media, products like newspapers, films and magazines are becoming more digital.

Because Bandura conducted his tests in the 1960s, long before the internet existed, he did not have the proof of audiences actively challenging the media, hence why he came to the conclusion that they instead simply consume and allow it to influence their behaviour.

A passive audience is one that enters a film and simply seeks out the film for entertainment. They see no deeper meaning or intended meaning from the director, with regards to the text. The film literally washes over them. For example, when you walk out of a film and say “Wow, the action was great in that film!”  

An active audience will look deeper into how the film is constructed. They will most likely know a substantial amount about how the film was made, other films in the franchise, the director’s previous work, the genre to which the film belongs to. They will look more at socio/political and historical contexts of the film and not simply see the film as a product made for mass consumption. For example, “Did you notice the homages made to previous films in Jurassic World? I like how the film made reference to the previous films in the genre, yet stayed original”. 

Explain the ways in which media products are thought to impact on audiences cognitively, affectively and behaviourally?  

the actual force exerted by a media message, resulting in either a change or reinforcement in audience or individual beliefs.