Copyright 1998, 1999, 2000 by Rich Cameron
  www.rcameron.com/journalism/100/online/4-lect-tvratings.html

The Effect of Ratings

Ever have your favorite show on television canceled and wondered why? Most likely it was because the show's ratings were down. The ratings determine how many people are watching a television show . . . . or listening to a radio station. Because the income for radio and television is largely connected to advertising, broadcasters are obsessed with ratings. The more people who watch or listen, the more they can charge and earn from advertising.

But wait a minute! Has anyone ever talked to you to find out what your favorite shows are and whether or not you are watching them? Probably not. Ratings are determined using random sampling techniques. Theoretically, every one of us has an equal opportunity of being polled by those who determine the ratings, but in reality, such small samples are used, few of us are ever contacted.

Before we go into how ratings are determined, perhaps we should make sure you don't confuse the program ratings with the new "rating" system that is designed to tell you about the violent and sexual content of television shows. What we are talking about here is a determination of how many people are watching.

There are a number of companies that determine ratings, but perhaps the best known ones are Arbitron and Neilsen. Arbitron is the main ratings company for radio and Nielsen is the best known for television. You can find out more about these companies on their Web sites at www.arbitron.com and www.neilsenmedia.com.

The Nielsen Family

Probably the most controversial, but widest used ratings technique is used by the Neilsen Company with its Nielsen Family Concept. About 1200 households in the country -- of the millions -- are invited at any given time to participate as a Nielsen family. You cannot volunteer, you can only agree to participate if asked. From the television watching habits of these 4000 households, determinations are made on what the rest of us must be watching. And from these determinations the fate of our favorite shows are determined.

The key element is in the demographics of the group. The Neilsen Company selects its participants randomly. Once potential participants are selected, the company checks the race, income, education, family size, etc. are checked with the known demographics of the population as a whole. Great care is taken to make sure that the percentages of key demographics match. The exact demographics used are kept secret by the company, though.

Nielsen then installs computer equipment that is attached to the family television set in the house. The computer records what is being watched and when. The data is forwarded to the Nielsen mainframe computer where it is compiled with the data from the other 4000 or so homes (again, the exact number is kept secret).Results can be determined almost instantly.

To verify the Nielsen Family statistics other methods are used, too. For instance, chances are that someone in the class has been asked to participate in the diary method in the past. With this method thousands of homes are asked to keep a diary of watching habits over a two-week period. You are usually paid $1 to participate (hey, when I was a kid we got only 25¢ for it!). At the end of two weeks you mail the dairy back in, where it is compiled and checked for accuracy (i.e., was the show you claimed to watch actually on at the time you said you watched it?). Then the results are compared against the Neilsen Family ratings determined weeks earlier.

Still another expensive, but reliable way to collect data is to actually phone people up and ask them what they are watching. With all the hang-ups that come with such a method, it is difficult to make sure the answers are representative.

What is a rating?

What, exactly, is a rating? It is a percentage of how many homes with television are actually watching a television show. The rating companies use census figures to calculate how many households in the country have television sets. Then once the companies determine how many people must watching a show, the number is divided by the number of homes with television sets. The mathematical formula looks like this:

Homes watching a show / homes with TV = rating

In other words, they are trying to determine how much a show can entice you to turn on your set and watch it.

A related, and important, calculation is the share. The share determines how big of an audience watching at any given time is watching the show. The mathematical formula looks like this:

Homes watching a show / estimated homes watching TV = share

Let's look at it another way. If there were only 100 homes with TVs and forty were tuned to a particular show, the rating would be 40, or 40 percent. But if of those 100 homes only 80 were watching TV and the other 20 were turned off, then the share the show gained would be a 20, or 20 percent of the homes actually watching TV.

A show that airs at a lousy television watching time might end up with a lousy rating, but pull a great share because nothing else on at the same time is any good. But sometimes good shows are scheduled opposite other good shows at popular time slots. The show might bring in a good rating, but a mediocre share because the other shows got good audiences, too.

 

Ratings homework assignment

Your next homework assignment is going to require you to look at the ratings of shows for a given week. You can find the information online, but your best bet is to look at the list of ratings printed each Wednesday in most daily newspapers. You can see the assignment at www.rcameron.com/journalism/100/assignments/tvratings.com. Please bring the completed assignment with you to the next test.

Reading Assignment

You should be reading Chapter Seven in your textbook to get more information about television ratings.

Exercise

Describe the difference between the two types of ratings mentioned in this lecture.

Note that when submitting the answer start the subject line with:

J100x-L -- YourLastName -- Ratings