A STUDY OF SOCIAL MESSAGING IN REGIONAL CINEMA AND ITS IMPACT ON PUBLIC AWARENESS

Abstract

Regional cinema has become a strong medium to reflect the reality of society and point out major social issues. This study investigates the role played by regional cinema’s social messaging on social attitudes and awareness. Primary data was collected with a quantitative research design from 200 participants with 5-point Likert scale-based questionnaire. Statistical techniques were employed in the study, such as, correlation, reliability analysis, independent samples t-test, and Linear Regression with IBM SPSS software. A significant and strong relationship was observed between awareness and social messaging. As per regression analysis, there is significant variance in awareness due to social messaging, which highlights its efficiency as a tool for communication. There is also a significant association between perceived social messages and public awareness, as per correlation findings. With t-test, it is found that people with higher exposure had stronger social attitudes than those without exposure. The study also focuses on the value of audience perception, which means emotional storytelling, realism, and relatability improve the effect of social messaging. While regional cinema influences social attitudes and awareness, it is found that there is variance in behavioral change across people. To conclude, regional cinema is very important to shape people’s attitudes and promote social awareness. It provides empirical evidence on the impact of regional films to promote social awareness.