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In the 1960s, cultural approaches to research emerged to challenge social scientific media effects theories and to compensate for those theories’ limitations. In contrast to social scientific media research, the cultural studies mode of media research involves interpreting written and visual “texts” or artifacts as symbols that contain cultural, historical, and political meanings. For example, researchers might argue that the wave of police and crime shows that flooded the TV landscape in the mid-1960s was a response to Americans’ fears about urban unrest and income disparity. A cultural approach thus offers interpretations of the stories, messages, and meanings that circulate throughout society.

Like social scientific media research, cultural studies media research has evolved in the decades since it first appeared.