Component 1, Section B: Understanding Audiences – Newspapers

This topic explores how newspapers target, construct, and position their audiences. You will analyse how tabloid and broadsheet newspapers use language, layout, and content selection to appeal to specific demographic and psychographic groups. Understanding audience is crucial because newspapers are commercial products that must attract readers to generate revenue through circulation and advertising. The WJEC A-Level exam requires you to apply theories of audience reception (e.g., Stuart Hall's encoding/decoding model) and uses and gratifications theory to unseen newspaper extracts.

You will study how newspapers segment audiences by age, gender, class, and political affiliation, and how they use techniques like sensationalism, moral panics, and ideological framing to engage readers. This section also covers the impact of digital media on newspaper audiences, including paywalls, social media sharing, and algorithmic personalisation. Mastering this topic allows you to critically evaluate how media texts shape and reflect societal values, a key skill for the exam's evaluation questions.

This topic connects to the wider Media Studies framework by linking production (newspaper ownership and economics) with reception (how audiences interpret texts). It also overlaps with representation, as newspapers often construct audiences through stereotypes and targeted content. In the exam, you will be asked to analyse how a newspaper extract addresses its audience and to discuss the implications of audience targeting for democracy and public discourse.