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Examining the findings of both cultural or social scientific research on media can help us follow a critical process that consists of describing, analyzing, interpreting, evaluating, and engaging with mass media. But the two models have strengths and weaknesses that are important to keep in mind. The cultural model is best at recognizing the complexity of media culture and providing analyses that draw on descriptive, critical, historical, ethnographic, political, and economic traditions. Yet this model has a downside: While cultural studies can help us see media from new perspectives, the conclusions laid out in a particular study may just be the author’s interpretation. They may not necessarily explain cause-and-effect connections in situations other than what the author examined.

The social scientific model seeks to develop and test theories about how the media affect individuals and society in measurable ways. This approach produces conclusions based on “hard” numbers, which policy makers often find comforting. It may suggest a clear chain of cause and effect, or at least a statistical relationship between the media and an effect.

But like the cultural model, the social scientific model has limits too. For example, the options provided in a multiple-choice survey question might not cover all the possible responses that participants could give. As a result, the researchers obtain an incomplete picture of how people respond to particular media. Also, definitions of what is being measured may confuse things. To illustrate, researchers might count a bonk on the head shown in a movie as “an act of violence,” even though the event could be purposeful, accidental, deserved, or part of a character’s fantasy. Researchers can thus neglect to ask more nuanced questions, such as whether accidental incidents of violence have a different effect on movie viewers than purposeful acts of violence. Finally, many social scientific studies are limited to questions that their funding sources—the government, media industry associations, or granting agencies—ask them to study. This situation further constrains the scope of their research.

Ultimately, though, the quality of any media research—cultural or social scientific—depends on the nature of the questions asked and the rigor of the method used. Oftentimes, “triangulating” with three or more approaches to test a question makes for much stronger conclusions. For those of us seeking to strengthen our media literacy by consulting research, the best approach may be to balance findings on a particular question from both the cultural and social scientific models.