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Understanding communication research findings.

Article Excerpt
A central aspect of communication research is widely misunderstood, ignored, or not known by researchers in other fields and by the public. The problems this creates are discussed; the correct understanding is identified, and an appeal is made for attention to the issue by researchers.

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This note examines a problem in my field of communication theory and research that has been plaguing us for decades. The problem is not that we do not have some valuable knowledge for researchers of consumer affairs and many other research fields and for the general public as well. Indeed, we know something very valuable for such others in their work and their daily lives, but we have not been very successful in convincing them of it. Aspects of human behavior seem to be all too effective in thwarting our efforts.

I first encountered this matter in my grad study at Michigan State University in a department at the communication college that specialized in theory and research. My first class in 1959 stressed the very central point that "Meanings are in people, not in messages"--not in words, nor pictures, nor sounds--nowhere in messages. It was like a mantra. We did not actually chant it, but we certainly said it often.

The point reflected how on numerous campuses in the 1950s and 1960s these schools, known generally as "journalism" schools, were acquiring new kinds of faculty. They were researchers, and they came in...

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