Question

Play theory of mass communication

Answer 1

William Stephenson, a British social scientist first introduced the concept play theory in his book “the play theory of mass communication”. Started his career in physics his interest in psychology led him to study in the University of London and received his second PhD in psychology. He served in India as a brigadier General during the world war by joining the British army. He served as the assistant director of psychology in the oxford university, and then in the University of Chicago and also as the director of advertising research for Nowland and company. Then he spends the rest of his professional life in the University of Missouri School of journalism as a professor till his retirement in 1974. He was the visiting professor in the University of Lowa till his second retirement in 1977.  He is well known for his expansion of unconventional form of factorial analysis involved with the process of subjectivity. Stephenson’s theory became influential as he approached the mass communication literature in a subjective and psychological manner rather than the conventional methods.