Fifth Blog - Public Service Broadcasting Now and in the Future - Audience Attitudes

FIFTH BLOG ENTRY

TITLE: Public Service Broadcasting Now and in the Future - Audience Attitudes

The title of the research project does accurately describe the research project. The entire document does talk about the public service broadcasting now and in the future. On the Executive Summary on of the points which are to be discussed in the report project is the role of broadcasting and the importance of public service broadcasting.

INTRODUCTION:

The research introduction does it make the purpose of the research project clear. When looking at point 3.2 Research objectives it does make the purpose clear it outlines research objectives clearly  

 This statement from the project “The overarching aim of the research was to understand audience behaviour and attitudes in relation to public service broadcasting and plurality” gives clarity on the purpose of the research.

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM:

This research project does not properly introduce the research problem. It only indicates the objectives and purpose of the research.  What comes closely to the research problem is the statement in the background information “The purpose of the research is to help inform the BBC’s submission to Ofcom’s second” this is not a clear research problem.

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY:

The reason for conducting the research is been explained in the research project. The statement in the research project, “The purpose of the research is to help inform the BBC’s submission to Ofcom’s second review of public service broadcasting, currently underway.” explains the reason for conducting the research.

THE RESEARCH QUESTION:

1 The research question is not clear. The author only has a research purpose and not research question.

2 Because there is no clear research question, author couldn’t justify the importance of this question to the scholarly community?

LITERATURE REVIEW:

There is no clear evidence of the fact that the has  author examined the relevant literature on the topic and persuasively explained why the research question posed has not yet been satisfactory answered?

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

Point 3.3 Research methodology describes theoretical framework of the research, the framework of the research is that It was decided that a two-stage methodology best suited the needs of the research: The research will be conducted in two phase.

RESEARCH APPROACH:

There is no clear evidence of how does the author explain and justify the contribution s/he will make with the research.

The research will be conducting the research in two phases.

The first phase would explore, in depth, attitudes held on a broad range of issues relating to public service broadcasting and plurality. It would also seek to understand the reasons underpinning any stated views.The second phase would then take forward the key issues with a view to generating statistically robust findings.

In this first phase research, the deliberative workshops ran for four hours per session. Six workshops were conducted, each comprising 20-22 participants, with the sample across all six workshops totalling 126, this statement from the research indicates that sampling was involved

The population of the sample is draw from the following dimensions

Age

• Gender

• Socio-economic grade

• Amount of TV watched

• TV platform

• Attitude to the BBC

• Internet access

• Ethnicity

With most researches a data collection instrument is needed. Data was collected by using quantitative research technique which comprised of a face-to-face and an online questionnaire survey, using the questions for almost a month. The data from the two techniques was merged

 Reliability and validity was not accounted for, the researcher went straight to interpreting data once data was collected.

RESULTS:

The results are fairly presented clearly in the text, tables and figures. The stats are clearly explained and they do make sense.

DISCUSSION:

 They are results explained in relationship to the theoretical framework but not in relation to research questions, but there is a relation to the significance to media studies.

CONCLUSION:

There are no clear recommendations for future research and policymakers. The research does share new information that can be used by future researchers.

Fourth Blog - Techniques in studying Media Institutions and Media Audiences

FOURTH BLOG ENTRY

THE RESEARCH TECHNIQUES ONE CAN EMPLOY WHEN STUDYING MEDIA INSTITUTIONS AND MEDIA AUDIENCES

 When studying media institutions and Media Audiences one needs to focus on object of analysis. There generally three research techniques that can be used to study Media Institutions and Media Audiences. These are the interview, Participant observation and Oral history

The interview

The interview as a research technique in media institutions and media audience research helps to find out about people's ideas, opinions and values. The interview can be used as a primary technique or as a secondary research technique. The disadvantage of using the interviews is that Interviews are laborious and can be a complete waste of time for the interviewee and interviewer.  Interviews should be used only for sourcing personal attitudes and opinions of Media audiences. Interviews can be conducted by face to face, telephone, or e-mail.  

An advantage of face-to-face interviews is that there is no major time delay between question and answer; the interviewer and interviewee can directly react interpersonally. An advantage of this immediate communication is that the answer of the interviewee is spontaneous.  Du one of the advantages of telephone interviewing is the extended access to interviewees, compared to Face-to-face interviews, geographically one can reach more interviewees with telephonic interview. With e-mail interviews you one can also reach more interviewees geographically.

Participant observation

One of the methods of understanding the Media usage by media audience and Media institutions is through observing participating by both Media audiences and Media Institutions. In participant observation, the researcher encroaches in the atmosphere. Participant observation is a technique which originates from anthropology and is used by scholars conducting fieldwork, usually living among the participants. Researchers have used the  participant observation technique in the past to observe the decision making process at work, the professional standards  of media workers, and how the ideology behind their work gets translated into media content. It has the advantage over interviews that you are observing as it happens, and not relying on your research participants’ narration of their behaviour

A major obstacle in commission this kind of research is access. Some media house might not allow a researcher to observe anything of any value to the research assignment. Participant observation requires a high level of cooperation on the part of both Media institutions and Media audiences; therefore it is highly important to receive the full cooperation from both when using this technique.

Oral history

Oral history involves interviewing people about their previous knowledge and experiences.  An oral history study of the Media Institutions will be useful if the researcher have access to people who have witnessed significant developments in the history of the media. Mark Williams, for example, interviewed Monty Margetts, a veteran presenter of an early television cooking show, using o the techniques oral history. The principal struggle of using this technique is in getting access to knowledgeable people in the industry to interview about the past. However researchers’ participants in oral history do not need to be well known people to assist with a trip down memory lane.

REFERENCES

Nordicom Review, Jubilee Issue 2007, pp. 149-167 Media Institutions as a Research Field

Nick Lacey. 2002 Media, Institutions and Audiences. Palgrave Macmillan

Mytton, G. 2007. Handbook on radio and television audience research. (Web edition). Paris: UNICEF and UNESCO.

Stokes, J. 2003. How to do media and cultural studies research. London: Sage

THIRD BLOG ENTRY - Studying Media Institutions and Media Audiences

THIRD BLOG ENTRY

STUDYING MEDIA INSTITUTIONS AND MEDIA AUDIENCES

1.    Purpose of studying media institutions

Different media institutions have different goals, mission and visions and have different audiences or are in competition the same audience.

 Over the years, the exploration of media institutions has often been ignored while academic attention has focused on the media products and consumers of the Media products. Many of the product which are used by consumers be it a newspaper article, television programme or Radio news bulletin are shaped by the Media Institutions that has produced it.

 When studying Media Institutions, it is important to remember that economics and profits are the most important factors determining what is produced. Even the community media like community radio stations needs money to survive, obtaining funding and advertising revenue is crucial part of these institutions.  The economics applies to every organisation, and there are no media institutions   which operate outside these forces. One needs to have an understanding of the balance book and an understanding how organizations make their bread and butter to carry on a good study of Media Institutions.

In most countries including South Africa, governments take an active interest in the media institutions. Here in South Africa government has an active interest in the South African Broadcast Cooperation (SABC). The political influence on public media institutions should be further explores to understand how these intuitions produces there products for consumption.

2.    Purpose of studying media audiences

  When analysing the purpose of studying media audiences it’s very important to look at who a media product is communicating with. ? It is also important to consider the Media Institutions who produce the media products that are consumed by Media audiences.  Different media institutions have different media audiences. For example, Metro FM Radio has a different ‘target Audience’ to Talk Radio 702, the two Radio stations below to the different media institutions.

 Different media products can also have a different Media audience. For example SABC 1 produces news in intervals from 17:30 on weekdays but the media audiences are clearly different. Media audiences can be segmented into different groups.  Segmentation of Media audiences can be done by age, race, gender, social class, education, location and language.

Studying Media Audience is also concerned with Media audience responses. Media Audiences also respond to the media products they watch, read and listen in a different way.  Most of the time audiences identify with certain products, like the youth may enjoy SABC 1 programme Skeem Saam because they identify with the characters on the show, they can even desire to be like them, or can associate with the story lines or action. Audiences also respond by participating like when they vote in the current IDOLSSA reality show on MNet.

In conclusion

It is difficult to study media institutions with having a full understanding of the following:

Ø  Media Products

Ø  Economics in the Media

Ø  Politics and Government influence.

REFERENCES

Nordicom Review, Jubilee Issue 2007, pp. 149-167 Media Institutions as a Research Field

Nick Lacey. 2002 Media, Institutions and Audiences. Palgrave Macmillan

Mytton, G. 2007. Handbook on radio and television audience research. (Web edition). Paris: UNICEF and UNESCO.

Stokes, J. 2003. How to do media and cultural studies research. London: Sage