Public Relations Practice 2014: Week 3

1. PUBLIC RELATIONS PRACTICE
2014
Week 3
!
DR KANE HOPKINS

2. 1
2Relevant models
Public relations campaigns

3. The current situation in New
Zealand
Child abuse and domestic violence are two
of New Zealand’s most pressing problems
– NZ has the fifth highest rate of child abuse in the
OECD
– A child dies of abuse every five weeks
– Almost 60% of all reported violence in New
Zealand is family related
– Research shows the police only hear about 20%
of all family violence incidents and 10% of sexual
violence offences

4. The culture of drinking
in New Zealand
• 20% of NZers aged 15 years or more who drank
alcohol in the past year has a potentially
hazardous drinking pattern
• One-third of all Police apprehensions involve
alcohol
• Half of serious violent crimes are related to
alcohol
• Over 300 alcohol-related offences are committed
every day

5. HERD MENTALITY

6. HERD MENTALITY
Poindexter says:!
Check out more
about this on a
Freakonomics
podcast

7. Please reduce energy in
your home in order to
reduce the expenditure of
resources on the planet

8. Please reduce energy in
your home in order to
reduce the expenditure of
resources on the planet
Please reduce energy
consumption in the home
in order to save money

9. Please reduce energy in
your home in order to
reduce the expenditure of
resources on the planet
Please reduce energy
consumption in the home
in order to save money
Please reduce energy
consumption so future
generations will have access
to these resources

10. Please reduce energy in
your home in order to
reduce the expenditure of
resources on the planet
Please reduce energy
consumption in the home
in order to save money
Please reduce energy
consumption so future
generations will have access
to these resources
The majority of your
neighbours are regularly
undertaking efforts to reduce
energy in their homes, please
follow.

11. PUBLIC RELATIONS
CAMPAIGNS

12. What is a PR Campaign?
• A strategic and focused approach to
communicating with a desired audience
• Employs a range of activities and media
• Mostly one-way communication
• Outcome of communication is determined by
communicator

13. PCCs defined
Public communication campaigns can be
defined as purposive attempts to inform or
influence behaviours in large audiences within
a specific time period using an organised set
of communication activities and featuring an
array of mediated messages in multiple
channels generally to produce
noncommercial benefits to individuals and
society.
(Rice & Atkin, 2009)

14. The three Es that influence
behaviour
Education
Engineering Enforcement

15. The three Es that influence
behaviour
Education
Engineering Enforcement

16. Smoke-free Environments Act 1990
Public Act 1990 No 108
Date of assent 28 August 1990
Commencement see section 1

18. All public relations programs and
campaigns should be based on
theories.
(McElreath, 1997)

19. Categories of theory
1. Theories of communication!
• The Shannon–Weaver model of communication!
• Hypodermic needle model!
• Situational theory!
• The public sphere!
2. Theories of receivers response!
• Behavioural public relations model!
• Social exchange theory!
3. Theories of practice!
• Four models of public relations!
• Systems theory

20. MODELS

21. The Shannon–Weaver model of
communication

22. Hypodermic Needle Model
• Infers that a message is directly received and
accepted by “helpless audiences”
• Largely considered obsolete today.

23. • Provides a tool to categorise publics’
perceptions of a situation and their
subsequent behaviour
• It is used to identify in segment an
organisation’s publics into four
categories;
– non-public
– latent public
– aware public
– active public
Situational theory of publics

24. Key factors
Level of involvement !
The extent to which
people perceive that what
an organisation that
involves them

25. Key factors Level of involvement !
The extent to which
people perceive that what
an organisation that
involves them
Problem recognition!
People know something
should be done about the
situation and think about
what to do

26. Key factors Level of involvement !
The extent to which
people perceive that what
an organisation that
involves them
Constraint recognition!
People perceive the obstacles
that limit their ability to do
something about a situation
Problem recognition!
People know something
should be done about the
situation and think about
what to do

27. Non-publics!
Experience no
consequences from issue
STP categories

28. Non-publics!
Experience no
consequences from issue
Latent publics!
Experience consequences
from issue but are not
aware of it
STP categories

29. Non-publics!
Experience no
consequences from issue
Latent publics!
Experience consequences
from issue but are not
aware of it
Aware publics!
Are aware of the issues and
consequences but have not
become active on the issue
STP categories

30. Non-publics!
Experience no
consequences from issue
Latent publics!
Experience consequences
from issue but are not
aware of it
Aware publics!
Are aware of the issues and
consequences but have not
become active on the issue
Active publics!
Are aware of the issues
and actively seek
information about the
issues
STP categories

31. High recognition
Low recognition
Low !
involvement
High !
involvement
Latent !
publics
Active !
publics
Aware !
publics
Non-!
publics

32. High recognition
Low recognition
Low !
involvement
High !
involvement
No!
abuse
Tax!
payers
Kids!
A woman
calls police

33. • Habermas (1989) propose the notion of a 'public
sphere', where citizens are able to rationally discuss
and debate issues in social, mediating environment
• The public sphere operates between the political
sphere and the private sphere
• The public sphere is threatened by large and powerful
organisations. These entities can overwhelm the public
sphere, dominating communication
• The need for equality in these relationships is essential
• With our quality, communication can become
strategic; that is, used as an instrument of force
The Public Sphere

34. Behavioural PR Model

35. • SET revolves around equity in relationships
• In PR, SET is based on the premise that people
want balanced relationships and not feel like
they ‘owe’ others
• People make judgements about the comparison
of alternatives based on a subjective cost–
benefit analysis
• Where there is a perceived imbalance in a
relationship, rational entities will communicate in
some way to regain balance
Social exchange theory

36. SET suggests…
• Individuals choose those alternatives from which they
expect the most profit
• Cost being equal, they choose alternatives from which they
anticipate the greatest rewards
• Rewards being equal, they choose alternatives from which
they anticipate the fewest costs
• Costs and other rewards being equal, individuals choose
the alternatives that supply or can be expected to supply
the most social approval (or those that promise the least
social disapproval)
• Costs and other rewards being equal, individuals choose
statuses and relationships that provide the most autonomy

37. SET suggests…
• Other rewards and costs equal, individuals choose
alternatives characterised by the least ambiguity in terms
of expected future events and outcomes
• Other costs and rewards equal, they choose alternatives
that offer the most security for them
• Other rewards and costs equal, they choose to associate
with, marry, and form other relationships with those
whose values and opinions generally are in agreement
with their own and reject or avoid those with whom they
chronically disagree
• Other rewards and costs equal, they are more likely to
associate with, marry, and form other relationships with
their equals, than those above or below them

39. • Grunig and Hunt (1984)
• The theory that is the most influential over
modern public relations
• A set of public relations typologies
Four Models of Public Relations

40. Press Agentry
• The earliest PR model to appear was press
agentry or publicity
• Characterised as one-way, source-to-receiver
communication
• Its purpose is largely propagandistic and the truth
is sometimes expendable
• Press agents did little research aside from
monitoring the media in which they sought to
place favourable articles about their clients.
• P. T. Barnum epitomises the model

41. Press Agentry
• The earliest PR model to appear was press
agentry or publicity
• Characterised as one-way, source-to-receiver
communication
• Its purpose is largely propagandistic and the truth
is sometimes expendable
• Press agents did little research aside from
monitoring the media in which they sought to
place favourable articles about their clients.
• P. T. Barnum epitomises the model

44. Public Information
• In 1920s press agentry model lost credibility with
journalists because they had been deceived by too many
times
• Ivy Lee developed the Declaration of Principles and sent
it to journalists
• He stated that journalists could expect accurate
information from his PR agency
• Communication still one-way but now adhering to the
truth as being important
• The model is predicated on the idea that if the public has
sufficient information and that information is truthful, then
the public will believe and behave in ways that are helpful
to the client.

48. Two-Way Asymmetric Model
• The two-way asymmetric model relies on two-
way communication: from source to receiver and
back to source
• The communicator attempts to change the
beliefs or behaviour of a public, but is not willing
to change its own beliefs or behaviours
• Imbalanced effects
• The two-way asymmetric model relies heavily on
research about the target publics

49. Two-Way Asymmetric Model
• The research is conducted through attitude
surveys and focus groups
• Practiced extensively today by many businesses
and PR agencies
• A limitation of the public information model is that
public failed to believe or behave in the desired
way
– Despite having accurate and truthful
information

50. Two-Way Symmetric Model
• The ideal form of communication according to
Grunig and Hunt
• mutual understanding
• two-way balanced communication
• high, formative and evaluation of understanding
• The TWSM advocates relationship building
through dialogue, listening, negotiation and
gained mutual understanding
• Dialectic Communication Perspective

56. References:
!
Habermas, J. (1989). Structural transformation of the
public sphere. Cambridge: MIT Press.
!
McElreath, M. (1997). Managing strategic and ethical
public relations campaigns (2nd ed.). Dubuque, IA:
Brown & Benchmark.