2015/10/21 by Peter Vorderer, Leonard Reinecke · 3 citations
Arts and Humanities · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Social Sciences · #Media Influence and Health #Cinema and Media Studies #Media Studies and Communication
paper · doi:10.1111/comt.12082
In recent years, entertainment theory has undergone a paradigmatic shift: The traditional conceptualization of entertainment as an exclusively pleasurable affective state has been significantly extended by recent two-factor models. These models have introduced a second dimension of entertainment that incorporates more complex nonhedonic experiences, such as the search for meaning or intrinsic need satisfaction. They have not only crucially altered the way communication scholars conceptualize the audience of media entertainment but also our discipline's view on the effects of entertaining media content. The present article discusses the implications of this changing model of the media user both for entertainment theory and research as well as for the discipline of communication as a whole.