Study Points: What is mass communication and explain the types of mass communication

MASS COMMUNICATION

It is another major communication setting. “Mass communication refers to the process by which we communicate with‘a large group of people through mass media.”
The difference between machine-assisted inter-personal communication and mass communication is not that clear, and dividing line between machine-assisted inter-personal communication and mass communication is not a distinct one.
The source in the mass communication situation is a group of individuals who usually act within predetermined roles in an organizational setting. In other words, mass communication is the end product of more than one person. Mass media is a source of communication with masses and communication through mass media is mass communication. Mass communication is different from inter and intra-personal
communication. In mass communication, society communicates with itself as an individual or a group of people convey a message to the large group of people and the} use intermediate transmitter of information such as magazines, newspapers, radio. television, books and posters or combination of these.

Types of Mass Communication

There are two types of mass communication :
(i) Micro-mass Communication
(ii) Macro-mass Communication

(i) Micro-mass Communication :
In this type of mass communication, we communicate with smaller number of people such as professor to his students. Usually this type of mass communication does not require any channel for conveying messages to the audience.
(ii) Macro-mass Communication :
In this type of mass communication, we communicate with large group of people. We communicate for conveying our messages to the large group of people through radio, TV, magazines and posters. In this process, the sender always uses channel for communication because communication with large group of people is not possible without any channel.