Compared with other types of communication activities, what are the characteristics of mass communication?

(1) The communicators in mass communication are specialized media organizations engaged in information production and dissemination. In western countries, media organizations mainly exist in the form of companies and corporate legal persons; In China, it is mainly in the form of enterprise management. This feature shows that mass communication is an organized communication activity under the guidance of specific organizational goals and policies.

(2) Mass communication is an activity of mass production, reproduction and dissemination of information by using advanced communication technology and industrialization means. The emergence and development of mass communication can not be separated from the progress of printing technology and electronic communication technology.

(3) The object of mass communication is the general public in society, that is, the "audience" in communication terminology. Audience is a vague concept of collection, not a certain class or group of society, but all the "ordinary people" in society. The universality of the audience means that mass communication is a large-scale communication activity aimed at meeting the information needs of most people in society, and it also means that it has a wide range of social influences across classes and groups.

(4) The information spread by mass media has both commodity and cultural attributes. As an industry that produces information products, the value of mass communication products is realized through the market. People have to pay a certain fee to get information from print media or electronic media, which shows that the information product of mass communication is a commodity itself. On the other hand, information products are different from ordinary material products that meet people's physiological needs, and people's consumption of them is mainly spiritual content.

(5) From the nature of the communication process, mass communication is a very one-way communication activity. To say that it is one-way does not mean that mass communication has no interactive mechanism, but that it is weak. The unidirectionality of mass communication is mainly manifested in two aspects: first, media organizations provide information unilaterally, and the audience can only choose and contact within the scope provided, which is passive to some extent; Second, there is no flexible and effective feedback channel, and the audience lacks the direct response ability to the activities of media organizations. The unidirectionality of mass communication process endows it with powerful social influence, which includes both positive and negative effects.

(6) Mass communication is an institutionalized social communication. Because mass communication is an information industry engaged in mass production and dissemination of information, its content is directly related to social concepts, values and behavioral norms. Because of the particularity of the communication process, it has great social influence, so no matter which country it is in, it will be brought into the track of social system.