Communication is a common phenomenon that cuts across the daily activities of human being. As food and water are very important to man’s survival so is communication. It is always a unique feature that differentiates the living from the dead. Obilade (1989) defines communication as a process that involves the transmission of message from a sender to the receiver. A group of Communication Scholars namely Babatunde Folarin, Dayo Soola, Isaac Ode, Frank Ugboajah variously define communication as follows:

• Any means by which a thought is transferred from one person to another (Folarin 2003).

• The process by which any person or a group shares and impacts information with/to another person(or group) so that both people(or groups) clearly understand one another (Soola 2000).

• Not just giving of information, it is the giving of understandable information and receiving and therefore, the transferring of a message to another party so that it can be understood and acted upon (Ode 1999).

• The process which involves all acts of transmitting messages to channels which link people to the languages and symbolic codes which are used to transmit such messages. It is also the means by which such messages are received and stored. It includes the rules, customs and conventions which define and regulate human relationships and events (Ugboajah 2001).

In its simplest form, however, Communication is the transmission of a message from a source to a receiver…or the process of creating shared meaning (Baran 20004:4)

Understanding Communication

It has been shown that there exists various definitions for communication, as there are different disciplines. While some definitions are human centred, others are not. For example, communication system may incorporate computers, as well as less sophisticated reproducing devices such as photocopiers. A photocopier may see communication as meaning different thing from the way a marketer perceives it. Similarly, a gospel preacher may think communication is something, which is of course different from what a journalist thinks it is. Therefore, there is no single definition of communication agreed upon by scholars. Psychologists, sociologists, medical practitioners, philosophers and communication specialists, all define communication based on their orientations and perspectives. Psychologists define communication as "the process by which an individual (the communicator) transmits stimuli (usually verbal symbols) to modify the behaviour of the other individuals (communicates)." This definition describes what many extension workers and change agents hope to achieve. Sociologists see communications “as the mechanism through which human relations exist and develop." Some people define communication rather narrowly, saying "communication is the process whereby one person tells another something through the written or spoken word." This definition, from a book written by a journalist, seems reasonable for those in that field. So, there are definitions of communication as there are various disciplines. Communication is from a Latin word- COMMUNIS, which means common or shared understanding. Communication therefore is a purposeful effort to establish commonness between a source and receiver (Schramn 1965). Whatever is being shared could be associated with knowledge, experience, thought, ideas, suggestion, opinions, feelings etc. We will define communication here as the process of exchanging or sharing information, ideas and feeling between the sender and the receiver. Communication is very central to all human activities; this is because everything we do and do not, communicate. Man’s interaction with other human beings is a result of communication. Communication is the key around which human life revolves.

What is Mass Communication?

Mass Communication is a means of disseminating information or message to large, anonymous, and scattered heterogeneous masses of receivers who may be far removed from the message sources through the use of sophisticated equipment. In other words, communication is the sending of message through a mass medium to a large number of people. Mass Communication represents the creation and sending of a homogeneous message to a large heterogeneous audience through the media. Mass communication studies the uses and effects of the media by many as opposed to the study of human interaction as in other communication contexts.

Stanley Baran defines Mass Communication as the process of creating shared meaning between the mass media and their audience. Also, John Bittner defines Mass Communication as messages communicated through a mass medium to a large number of people. One needs to underscore the underlying fact that what is common in every definition of mass communication anywhere in the world is that it is communicated through a mass medium. In other words, for any message to be regarded as being mass communicated, it must be disseminated through a mass medium like Radio, Television, Newspaper and Magazine. Mass Communication can also be defined as a device by which a group of people working together transmits information to a large heterogeneous and anonymous audience simultaneously. It is a process by which information originates from the source to the receiver, having been thoroughly filtered and transmitted through a channel ( Sambe 2005:29).

Features of Mass Communication

Mass Communication is distinguished from other kinds of communication by a number of features or characteristics. They are: 1. Mass Medium 2. Presence of Gatekeepers 3. Delayed Feedback 4. Limited Sensory Channels 5. Impersonal Vs Personal Communication Mass Medium For a medium to be regarded as mass in communication it must have acquired fifty million adopters (Kaye & Medoff 2005).

Radio, Television, internet etc are examples of media which are regarded as mass media because they can reach out to no fewer than fifty million audience at a time. In mass communication, messages reach far beyond the immediate proximity of the sender and could even get to the uttermost part of the world.

Presence of Gatekeepers

In mass communication, sent messages do not reach the audience in raw form. Messages are usually ‘treated’. The implication of this is that there is usually no guarantee that what the message receivers get is exactly the message sent by the source. In mass media organizations, the gatekeepers are usually the reporters, sub-editors, editors, producers, writers, etc. The concept of gatekeeper was first coined by Kurt Lewin who describes gatekeepers as individuals or groups of persons who govern the travels of news items in the communication channels. Gatekeepers could also be defined as any person or formally organized group directly involved in relaying or transferring information from one individual to another through a mass medium. A gatekeeper can be a film producer who cuts a scene from the original script, a network censor who deletes a scene from a prime – time show because it is perceived as being too sexually explicit, a director who determines what segment of film to use in a documentary, a newspaper executive who determines the topic for an editorial, or any other individual in the processing or control of messages disseminated through mass media (Bittner 1989:12).

In actual sense, a gatekeeper does three major functions: 1. Limiting the information through editing before dissemination. 2. Expanding the amount of information by injecting additional views or angles. 3. Reorganizing or Reinterpreting the information gathered before disseminating it. Delayed Feedback Unlike in interpersonal communication where reply/feedback is made almost instantly, the feedback in mass communication is always delayed, say for a day, week or month. Burgoon et al 1978 cited in Folarin 1994 says “Feedback is often limited, delayed and indirect”. Mass Communicators are usually subject to additional feedback in form of criticism in other media, such as a television critic writing a column in a newspaper (Baran 2004:7).