ABSTRACT
Now that you’ve read these chapters, think again about some questions raised in the introduction to this book: does the social scientific or the critical/cultural studies approach seem to make more sense to you? Why? What do you think are the strengths and weaknesses of each approach? If you were going to investigate media effects, how would you approach the subject? Which types of questions (narrow or broad) do you think are more important? Which do you think are easier to answer? Which methods provide more valid and valuable results? Is it possible to maintain one’s objectivity while studying human beings? What is lost, and what is gained, by holding one perspective (social scientific) over the other (critical/cultural)? Can researchers borrow from both traditions? Should they? If so, how? What would be gained? At what cost? The answers to these and other questions will influence how you interpret the scholarship you engage as you continue through school, and beyond. As you ask these questions, you are being a critical participant in our academic system/tradition of scholarship and research.
