Electronic Media: Class 11, Ratings and Audience Research
Electronic Media: Class 11, Ratings and Audience Research
Research Methods
telephone recall method
Cooperative Analysis of Broadcasting, 1930
active reporting
telephone
asked people to recall what they listened
telephone coincidental method
C.E. Hooper, 1946
active/passive reporting
telephone
asked people what they are listening
program and station
diary
Arbitron, 1949
active reporting
recording their viewing
mailed finished diary
audimeter
A.C. Neilsen, 1942
passive reporting
mechanically “record” on 16-mm film
station and time
programs are derived from this information
storage instantaneous audimeter
Neilsen, 1960s–1970s
passive reporting
audimeter
transmitted over phone line
People Meter
AGB Television Research, late 1980s
active/passive reporting
users “log in”
People Meter records a person’s viewing
Portable People Meter
Neilsen, 2000s
active/passing reporting
users carry PPM
PPM records what media user is consuming
Accuracy
Media Relations Council
watchdog group
audits accuracy
population
random sample
95% confidence interval
biases
non-response bias
social desirabilty bias
Radio Ratings
Measuring Radio Audiences
Arbitron
Weekly Diary
Network
~50,000 surveys
Local
between 750 and 4,500 surveys
Radio Market Report
for each of 280 local markets
Reporting Radio
Rating
The audience expressed as a percentage of the total
population.
Share
The percentage of those listening to radio in the Metro
who are listening to a particular radio station.
Cume
Persons: The total number of different persons who tune
to a radio station during the course of a daypart for at
least five minutes.
Rating: The Cume Persons audience expressed as a
percentage of all persons estimated to be in the
specified demographic group.
Average Quarter-Hour
Persons: The average number of persons listening to a
particular station for at least five minutes during a
15-minute period.
Rating: The average Quarter-Hour Persons estimate expressed
as a percentage of the population being measured. This
estimate is printed for the MSA and DMA. It can also be
computed for the TSA.