This book is" primarily a collation of the findings of published research…. Part I deals with mass communication as an agent of persuasion…. Part II deals with the effects of specific kinds of media content." A new orientation is suggested: the" Phenomenistic" approach which" is in essence a shift away from the tendency to regard mass communication as a necessary and sufficient cause of audience effects, toward a view of the media as influences, working amid other influences, in a total situation." The following generalizations are central to organizing the research findings:(a) mass communication by itself does not act as a necessary and suficient cause of audience effects and (b) mass communication typically reinforces existing conditions, rather than changing them.(270 ref.) From Psyc Abstracts 36: 01: 1GI02K.(PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved)