C. Bonjorni Spring 2002
Imagine for a moment that you are out one night with your friends. After a long night of hanging out you decided to go outside and get into the hot tub. Now it is a pretty cold night and the sky isn’t to clear, but the water is warm and nice, so you don’t mind. While you are out there you hear a rumbling in the sky, and then a loud crash. What do you think of? What is the first word that comes to your mind? How do you react to the sound, or do you at all? And why? These are some of the main questions that should be considered when looking at Charles Osgood’s mediation hypothesis.
Now before we look at the theory its self we need to take some time to think about the main things that needed to be looked at before this theory was able to come about. The first thing that Osgood studied was the meaning of words. How we learn them and how much of a role they play in our language. Now this might sound like a silly statement to most, ‘how much of a part do words play in our language’, because to most and I know to me, I thought of words as our language. That was what language was to me. Yet after studying this hypothesis I have found that language goes much deeper than just words. Something that I never considered before was, where does the word come from and how do we decide what the word is associated with? Now this concept doesn’t directly tie in with the mediation hypothesis, yet it does a play a part in the study of understanding the meaning of meaning, which is what Osgood, specialized in. This then leads us into the theory and how it plays an important role in this understanding process (Tannenbaum 5-9)
Charles Osgood’s mediation hypothesis is a theory that can be laid out very simply, yet in nature it is very complex. The key elements of this theory are first, physical stimulus, which is something that you see or hear. This physical stimulus will then lead to an internal response, which is a natural response, almost un-thought of, (I will provide an example later). This internal response will then lead to a internal stimulus, which is the thoughts in which you relate this stimulus to, and then last it will lead to an outward response. This outward response is the visible or physical response that takes place due to the first response. This can also be seen as the feed back to the message. Because this is a theory, which plays on emotions, the other side that we need not leave out which Osgood uses as a means in measuring this response is the scale of emotions. To envision what this scale would look like, I want you to imagine for a moment two lines which are drawn similar to what an (X) and (Y) inter-slope axis in math would look like. Which means that they are drawn perpendicular to each other forming four right angles at the intercept point in the center. With that, label the vertical top point with the adjective Good and then the opposing side of that same line Bad. Now on the horizontal axis I want the one end labels inactive, and then the opposite side labeled active. The next line to be drawn is going to go at a diagonal angle, which will also meet at the center point and continue through. This line will be labeled strong and weak. The purpose of this chart or graph is to show the degrees to which a word or the physical stimulus affects you. In other words how much meaning is attached to that sign for you personally. This can also be plotted on a table, which might be similar to a 1-10 chart 10 being the best and 1 the worst and so forth. (Littlejohn 117-120)
Now that we have the basic components to the theory lets break it down into stages so that we might better understand the theory as a whole and then see why it applies to us. While I was reaching this topic I found many examples that were used to describe this theory, yet the one that made it clearest for me was the example of thunder. I tried to bring this example into play at the beginning in the introduction, but to make things a little more clear lets run through that idea again. After you hear the rumbling and the crash in the sky, according to Osgood your mind will then process the thunder on three different levels, which will each effect behavior in one way or another.
The first of the three levels that I want to look at is the process level, or the sensation level. It is in this level when the basic stimulus response reaction occurs. An example of this would be after you hear the loud clap and the rumbling in the sky you might jump, or have a tensing of your muscles. Now the important point that Osgood makes in relation to this stage is that the loud sound that you hear doesn’t mean any certain thing. According to Osgood in this sensory stage no meaning is taking place, it is “merely a mirror of what is.”(Griffin 1-8)
The second stage is the perception level. This is the stage at which input occurs, or when we use our senses, eyes, ears, touch, etc. and then relate what we take in from our senses to something that we have experienced in the past. An example of this might be with you and your past experiences with thunderstorms. You might have seen many in your life and when you hear the rumbling in the clouds, followed by the clap you then relate, those noises to the word thunder. Which can then lead you to relating the word thunder with, lighting, rainstorm and so forth. The tense feeling that you received after hearing the sounds in the sky or the thunder might not be because you are afraid of thunder, but more so because you have a fear of lighting which you relate to thunder. The important point that Osgood makes with his theory is that it is not the word thunder that brings on the reaction, because if you where just to hear the word you might not have the same reaction to it as you did with the actual sign of thunder in the sky. The mediation theory places more emphasis on what the word signifies and not so much on what it means. This is also tied in with the third level, which is representational. It is this level that I began to describe when I was discussing that the word is only part of the reaction. The word thunder doesn’t make your muscles tighten, but the sound itself is what caused that reaction. (Griffin 1-8)
To put this theory very plainly, you see, hear, etc. a stimuli, that then leads you to an emotional response, which then leads you to outward reaction to that emotional response. Your emotional response occurs because it can be related to something that has occurred in your past experiences. So the thought process that you must go through to make meaning of the initial stimuli must go though that emotional state which will then cause you to have meaning to a word or to relate a word to what that stimuli means to you. Osgood has set up a three stage model of meaning, “1) the word (ex. Thunder) gets through our sensory and perceptual filters and is decoded to the extent that it’s recognized as a sign of something else. 2) Our meaning for the word is then established through association with the actual event, but this is a process of mediation representation rather than a knee-jerk cause and effect relationship. 3) Finally, internal self-stimulation is encoded into an overt behavioral response to the word.” (Griffin1-8)
Now to analyze Osgood’s mediation theory using the criteria that we have learned and studied in class. The first thing that we need to look at is the wither or not the theory is capable of corrigibility and verifiability. And we can see with this theory it is possible to test it and have a verity of observation results, yet the end result is often the same. The reason that this is, is because a word or a stimulus can mean something different to every person, yet even through the meanings might be different, the reactions can be the same. The next thing to consider is if this theory is a valuable one. When looking at this theory we can see that it is a step closer to understanding meaning from symbols and language, and with that it makes it valuable. I feel that one of the main areas in which Osgood’s theory holds up in the heuristic value that it plays in our measurement of meaning. Not only does he give us a way in which to investigate this theory for ourselves but he also has created a model for us to look at to compare and contrast the results while testing this theory. That was the model that was described earlier in which the (X) and (Y) axis were used. It is this model which helps lead us to our goal or solution.
As we look at the ways in which this theory can be helpful in addressing problems or meeting practical needs in the real world, I think that one of the main things that we should look at is a phobia. If we look at the many things in this world with which people have a phobia of we will find that in almost all of these cases this theory applies to them in one way or another. For example if you study people who have a fear of flying, you will see certain traits that through this theory are better understood as to why the reaction that happens takes place. In our book they give this as an example to those who hear the word airplane there is no initial reaction to the word, yet when they see a plane they think of fear, heights, and crashing therefore the actual sight of the airplane leads them to the reaction of not boarding the plane. The book also gives us an example of a spider, which is another type of phobia that many people experience. They discuss the ways in which we assimilate words such are big, hairy and scary with the word spider and it those words which cause the emotional stimulus with in us not just the word spider (Littlejohn 117-120).
I believe that this theory is used by many of us on a regular bases; yet we are not only unaware of the theory but also I don’t think that we realize to degree to which our mind process information. I don’t know if I completely agree with Osgood’s theory, but I do know that since I have had the opportunity to study this theory I have gain a greater knowledge for the level at which we gain and retain information. I never before realized how we gained and associated the meanings of words with other words. I believe that this theory of Charles Osgood had been a very good attempt to explain the meaning of meaning and as far as I have studied I have not found anything to which I could compare this to.