THE DEVELOPMENT OF COMMUNICATION STUDIES IN SOCIAL CONTEXTS OF RUSSIAN PSYCHOLOGY
In the following article the authors analyze history and current state of psychological study in the field of mass communications. The analysis is based on the psychological concept of Galina Andreeva, which reveals interconnections between social cognition and social changes. Transitivity, instability and ambiguity of actual state of development of Russian society directs the turn to qualitative methodology and methods of research the social representations and image of social world, that is constructed in media. Several general results of authors' research cases are described in the article. Those research cases allow making the general summary that is the following: relation to media becomes a central element of social representations in current society (independently from the information transferred through the media). This data proves out the formula of Marshall McLuhan 'The Medium is the Message'.