About Hall’s encoding and decoding model,this is a process of information transmission and interpretation. As Hall suggests, the way users interpret the received information is influenced by various factors, such as the users’ ideologies, preconceived notions subtly instilled by social media, and even physical barriers (such as noisy environment or inherent hearing impairments). Whether information is successfully transmitted and understood can sometimes be challenging due to these individual differences.
The Whisper Challenge game provides an excellent illustration of the encoding and decoding model. In the game, one player tries to describe the answer as accurately as possible, while the other player wears headphones playing distracting music and attempts to guess the correct answer by reading the speaker’s lips, gestures, and other cues. This game is often played as a larger “telephone” style game, with 4-5 players or more. However, in most cases, by the time the correct answer reaches the last player, it has transformed into an answer that sounds phonetically similar but has a completely different meaning. This scenario simulates how, in a distracting environment, different individuals interpret and understand information in varied ways, highlighting that people’s encoding and decoding abilities are not only different but also subject to interference from various factors.
Such as this video,On The Tonight Show, Jimmy and Chris Evans played this Whisper game. When Jimmy said “Boo”, Chris mistakenly heard it as “Poo”. Later, when Chris said “Donkin Coolatta”, Jimmy kept repeating “Talking to Italian”. This created a nonsensical and humorous exchange. Both Chris and Jimmy were accurately encoding the words on the paper, but due to the music in their headphones, they misunderstood the information while decoding. The mistake wasn’t due to a lack of understanding of the meaning or pronunciation, but rather the physical interference from the noise. This kind of failure in decoding due to physical distractions is quite common in real-life communication.
Although errors or failures in information interpretation are largely influenced by factors such as a user’s knowledge base, life experience, educational background, and comprehension abilities, the Whisper Challenge offers a clear and intuitive way to observe the process of successful or failed information decoding. It also allows participants to pinpoint exactly where the breakdown in communication occurs during the transmission of the message. This makes it a valuable tool for visually illustrating how various factors can influence the understanding and misinterpretation of information.
Reference list:
1.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LUzHX7wi4g
In this blog, Stuart Hall’s encoding and decoding theory has been slightly explained, but audiences that have no knowledge of the theory might get lost as it feels like you haven’t gone into depth about the theory so the audience may feel that there is some information missing about the theory.
The example you used is good at representing how audiences have different interpretations of the media they consume. However, this example didn’t allow you to go into depth about the theory so maybe another example may have helped you do this so you can fill in these missing parts of the theory you haven’t included in the blog. Another example could have let you mention the concept of dominant, negotiated and oppositional readings from the audience and can lead you to explain that Hall believes the audience isn’t passive, but very active due to the audience being able to decode the encoders (producers) message.
Overall, the blog is good at slightly explaining the theory and the example you used grazes the surface of the decoding from the audience. An example that demonstrates different readings will allow you to delve deeper into the theory itself and allow for the audience to gain more knowledge about the theory which will make the blog and the information easier to follow.
Hi Xinyi! I really like the example you chose of the Whisper Challenge to explain Hall’s encoding and decoding theory. I think it’s a really fun way to explain Hall’s theory in a literal way to someone who may not have heard about it before.
The Tonight Show’s Whisper Challenge is all about giving messages when you can’t properly hear somebody – it is a really great example of how messages may get lost in translation or misunderstood via communication. It is accurate that frequently people misunderstand each other in real life. I really like your addition of the video to further explain the game, and it also shows just how easy it is for messages to be confused and taken the wrong way.
As it is so common in real life to mishear or not fully understand what people are saying, the Whisper Challenge is a perfect example to illustrate this. This is a really interesting interpretation of Hall’s theory and I really enjoyed reading it! 🙂