The 80's brought cheap digitial synthesizers to the masses.

Electronic music has existed since the 1900's, but early techniques and instruments were very expensive or not easily available. During the 60's in 70's you could find alot of synthesizers and electronic music in popular film and television, though the equipment still not accessible to anyone outside the prof recording studios.

a good example is Giorgio Moroders contribution to Midnight Express(1978) :)

But as music technology evolved it became cheaper, and different synthesis techniques evolved and ways to emulate them with computers did as well. You could really tie the availability of cheap synths with computers, which is exactly what digital synthesizers are.

Particularly the Korg M1 and the Roland D50 stand out in particular, these were EASILY the most popular units and the most widely produced. If you familiarize yourself with the preset sounds and rom cards associated with these units and other ones contemporary to these, you will really start to notice how widely used these were in 80's dance music, film/tv scores, and jingles.