document resume ac 012 800 darden, douglas w.; bertrand ... · ed 067 526. document resume. 08. ac...

ED 067 526

DOCUMENT RESUME

08 AC 012 800

AUTHOR Darden, Douglas W.; Bertrand, Alvin L.TITLE Tuning In On Rural Louisiana: A Survey of Adult Radio

Listening and Television Viewing Habits.INSTITUTION Louisiana State Univ., Baton Rouge. Cooperative

Extension Service.PUB DATE Feb 71NOTE 22p.

EDRS PRICE MF-$0.65 HC-$3.29DESCRIPTORS Community Surveys; *Mass Media; News Media; Radio;

*Rural Education; *Surveys; Television; *TelevisionSurveys

ABSTRACTStudy was undertaken to obtain information on use

rural Louisianians make of radio and television, and to determine thepart various mass media play in lives of rural people. Informationwas solicited from 25 households within each of 12 parishes in thestate. Total number of persons sampled was 600. Cultural background,economic enterprises in parishes, relationship to metropolitancenters were factors considered. Results show women spend more timewatching TV than men; income is not significant; the young and oldare most avid TV and radio fans; and Negroes devote more time toradio and TV than whites. Most important mass media source ofhomemaking and agricultural information was magazines, of local,national and international news was TV. Study implies that more workshould be done on television to reach more of rural population. [Twographs showing data collected are of marginal legibility. ] (t4F)

rtrr4-4^Af7y,I

U S DEPARTMENT DF HEALTH.EDUCATION & WELFAREOFFICE OF EDUCATION

THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRO.DUCED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED FROMTHE PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIG!HATING IT POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS STATED 00 NOT NECESSARILYREPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OF EDUCATION POSITION OR POLICY

4 46

Reled Catitiaa

envy of Adult Radio listening

and

Television Viewing Wits

LSU Cooperative Exfension Service

CONTENTS

Page

Introduction 3Purpose of the Study 3Conceptual Frame of Reference 3

Methodological Procedures 4

Choosing the Sample 4Sampling Procedure 5The Diary 5The Interview Schedule 5

Statistical Procedures 5

Television Viewing and Radio Listening Patternsof Household Heads and Their Spouses 6

Television Viewing Patterns 6Weekday Viewing Patterns 6

Saturday Viewing Patterns 10Sunday Viewing Patterns 11Radio Listening Patterns

Time Devoted to T.V. Viewing and Radio Listeningby Various Classes of Ruralites 14

Color T.V. Increases Viewing Time 14Women Spend More Time Watching T.V. Than Men 15Income Does Not Significantly Affect T.V.

Viewing and Radio Listening 15The Young and the Old are the Most Avid

T.V. and Radio Fans 16Education Does Not Significantly Affect

Viewing and Listening Time 16Soda' Participation and T.V. Viewing and

Radio Listening are Related 16Level of Living is Not Significant in T.V.

Viewing and Radio Listening 17Negroes Devote More Time to Radio and

T.V. Than Whites 18Reading and Radio Listening Significantly

Associated, but Reading and T.V. are Not 18

The Most Important Mass Media Sources of Homemaking,Agricultural and News Information 19

The Most Important Source for HomemakingInformation 19

The Most Important Source for AgriculturalInformation 19

1

Table 1.

Table 2.

Table 3.

Table 4.

Table 5.

Table 6.

Table 7.

Table 8.

Table 9.

TABLES

Mean Viewing Times of Color TelevisionSet Owners and Black and White TelevisionSet Owners 14

Mean Viewing Times by Sex 15

Mean Listening Times by Sex 15

Mean Viewing Times by Income 15

Mean Listening Times by Income 15

Mean Viewing Times by Age 16

Mean Listening Times by Age 16

Mean Viewing Times by Education 16

Mean Listening Times by Education 16

Table 10. Mean Viewing Times by Social Participation 17

Table 11. Mean Listening Times by Social Participation 17

Table 12. Mean Viewing Times by Level of Living 17

Table 13. Mean Listening Times by Level of Living 17

Table 14. Mean Viewing Times. by Race 18

Table 15. Mean Listening Times by Race 18

Table 16. Mean Viewing Times by Amount of Read-ing Materials Received in Households 18

Table 17. Mean Listening Times by Amount of ReadingMaterial Received in Households 18

Table 18. Most Important Sources for VariousTypes of Information by Percentageof Rural Louisiana Respondents 19

TUNING IN ON RURAL LOUISIANAA Survey of Adult Radio Listening

and Television Viewing Habitsby

Douglas W. Darden and Alvin L. Bertrand*

IntroductionPurpose of the Study

This study was undertaken to gather informa-tion on the use which rural Louisianians are mak-ing of radio and television. Information wassought primarily to provide information to theLouisiana Cooperative Extension Service andother agencies interested in the dissemination ofinformation on agriculture, home economics, andrelated subjects to the people of the state. In thisregard, in Louisiana, the Cooperative ExtensionService attempts to disseminate as much educa-tional material as possible through mass media.This agency distributes approximately 1300 radiotape recordings and 500 spot announcements eachyear to radio stations throughout the state. Some150 agents broadcast on radio stations in 42 par-ishes on a regular basis. In television, agents andspecialists appear regularly on 12 of the state's16 VHF commercial television stations.

A secondary, but important, purpose of thestudy was to determine the part the various massmedia play in the lives of rural people. It is gen-erally accepted that recent changes in mass me-dia have changed the habits of the rural popula-tion, but no study has been conducted in Louisi-ana on radio in some 20 years and none on tele-vision in the last 10.1 Therefore, this study shouldbe of interest to the Extension Service as well aspersons or organizations interested in reachingrural adult audiences. Finally, while the presentstudy finds its inspiration in the above purposes,it is also an attempt to focus attention upon socialchange in rural areas of the nation. While thefindings reported here may not be applicable tothe entire national population, they at least pro-vide some measure for studying the evolvingscene. (Rural residents will be referred to in thispublication as ruralites, as opposed to urbanitesor suburbanites.)

The above indicates the overall objectives ofthe study. The specific aims were as follows:

1. To determine the time ruralites spend watch-ing television and listening to radio.

2. To determine the television viewing and ra-dio listening patterns of ruralites.

3

3. To determine the rural audience's reactionto homemaking and agricultural programsbroadcast via radio and television.

4. To provide insight into the relationship ofsuch factors as income, age, education, so-cial participation, race and level of livingto television viewing and radio listening.

5. To compare radio listening and televisionviewing patterns of today with those of pre-vious studies.

Conceptual Frame of ReferenceIt is not possible, in a publication such as this,

to do more than briefly outline the theoreticalframe of reference employed for the study. Themodel used is within the tradition of sociologyand is specifically related to the master socialprocess of communication. This process is studiedwithin the context of social systems (or groups)and is meant to articulate the structural elementsof relevant systems such as norms, roles and stat-us-positioils. These elements are articulated in thecourse of sending the receiving messages fromwhat might be termed a "public agency" systemto what might be termed a client system. Thecommunication process can thus be seen as vitalto instigated social actiona primary purposeof the Cooperative Extension Service.

Social action takes place within the context ofsocial systems, although all of the subsystems of ageneral system may not be involved directly in agiven program. The problem envisioned for thisstudy was that of increasing the effectiveness ofCooperative Extension workers and others aschange agentsin the sense of diffusing informa-tion about new and improved practices. It is clearthat the first requirement for effective communi-cation is the exposure of a client public to a mes-

*Associate Editorial Specialist, Louisiana CooperativeExtension Service and Professor, Department of Sociologyand Rural Sociology, Louisiana State University, respec-tively.

'See: Alvin L. Bertrand and Homer L. Hitt, Radio HabitsIn Rural Louisiana, Louisiana Agricultural ExperimentStation Bulletin 440, September, 1949 and Alvin L. Bertrandand Frederick L. Bates, Television In Rural Louisiana,Louisiana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 518,December, 1958.

sage. This is the fact which inspired the generalthrust of the present study, that is, the attemptto learn the characteristics of the rural audience.However, it is also clear that the sender of amessage must know certain facts about the pat-terns and preferences of the intended receiver (s)of the message if he is to achieve credibility.This, too, was in mind in planning the present re-search. Finally, it is clear that both senders andrecipients of messages have definite positions inthe overall social structure. These positions pro-vide a cognitive frame within the context ofwhich a relationship is established. The natureof this relationship is a factor in effective com-munication and needs to be known as precisely aspossible by those preparing and sending messages.

The present study was designed to shed somelight on the communicator-recipient relationshipwith regard to the aims of the Cooperative Ex-tension Service program.

In the discussion which follows, no deliberateeffort is made to relate the findings to a theoreti-cal model. However, it is felt the reader will havelittle difficulty in envisioning that the analysesare implicitly, if not explicitly, in terms of theExtension Service as a social system, the membersof which are interested in communicating change.By contrast, the rural population of Louisianarepresents the population group from which mem-bers of the target systems are drawn. The lattermight be farm or other types of rural organiza-tions.

METHODOLOGICAL PROCEDURES

The objectives previously outlined guided theplanning of the methodological procedures for thestudy. In this regard, it was deemed necessarythat the data obtained be representative for thestate and give a comprehensive picture of the useof radio and television by adult ruralites.

Choosing the SampleIt was obvious that, because of manpower lim-

itations, sampling could not be done in everyparish. Therefore, the decision was made to sam-ple in 12 oT the 64 parishes in the state. Theseparishes were selected with special care to insurethat a wide geographic distribution was obtained.Other considerations included factors such as cul-tural background, types of economic enterpriseswithin the parishes and relationship to majormetropolitan centers.2 Consultations were heldwith the three state district Extension agents toassure that the decisions were reasonable.

4

Parishes that participated in the study wereBienville, Calcasieu, DeSoto, East Feliciana,Grant, Lafourche, Richland, St. Landry, Tangipo-hoa, Tensas, Vermilion, and Vernon.

Another concern in the research procedure wasthe number of households from which informa-tion could be gathered. The resources of time andmoney were such as to necessitate a limited num-ber of interviews. It was decided to solicit infor-mation from 25 households within each parish.This number was designed to yield a total sampleof 300 households. Since it was planned to obtaininformation from the heads of households andtheir spouses, the total number of persons to besampled was 600, or 0.05 per cent of the total

2For a discussion of rural social areas of Louisiana, seeAlvin L. Bertrand, The Many Louisianas, Louisiana Agri-cultural Experiment Station Bulletin 496, June 1955.

projected rural population in Louisiana for 1967.The projected rural population was 1,185,000."

Sampling ProcedureCounty agents in all parishes agreed to help

conduct the survey. Workshops were set up toinstruct them in the procedures to be used andto acquaint them with the survey instruments.

A modified probability area sampling techniquewas used to draw the sample households.4 Eachagent was given a copy of a Louisiana Departmentof Highways map for his parish which showeddwellings that existed in 1963. On his map, eachagent was asked to designate two or more areaswhose inhabit, nts would be representative of allpeople in his parish. He was then instructed totake into consideration the types of rural enter-prises within his parish as well as cultural andother considerations. No incorporated areas wereincluded.

The agents were instructed to draw a circlearound the designated areas and approximate thenumber of dwelling units within each circle. Atthis point the agents were inst7ucted to locatesome basic and convenient landmark within thecircles. In most cases these were roads or high-ways. The agent then began counting dwellingsuntil he arrived at a random interval number de-signed to provide the needed 25 households.

The twaexceptions to the above procedure werein Vernon and Tensas parishes. The agent fromVernon Parish indicated rural dwellers in his par-ish were homogeneous, so he devised a plan touse the rural mail routes that began from hisbase headquarters in Leesville, Louisiana. Theseroutes covered the entire parish, and he used pre-determined intervals between houses to selectsample households.

In Tensas Parish the population was also de-termined to be homogeneous. Here, however, thenames and addresses of all rural persons in theparish were on the agent's mailing list. This listwas divided by an interval number to produce thetwenty-five sample households needed.

Interviewers were instructed to select alternatehouseholds according to this manner: If there wasneither a radio nor a television set in the home, orif there was no person in the home who was ableto keep the diary, they were to go to the nextdwelling. They were also instructed to call backat least twice before going to an alternate house.A total of 302 household interviews was taken inthe state.

c; 5

The DiaryA major procedural decision was to place a log

or diary in each household falling in the sampleand to ask some member of the household to re-cord the times each member watched televisionor listened to radio within a one-week period. Thediary used was very similar to the one used by theAmerican Research Bureau as described bySteiner.5 One diary was provided for radio log-ging and another for television logging. An in-struction sheet with a sample page of a completeddiary for one day was left with each diary.

Interviewers were instructed to encourage thekeeping of the diary by a younger member of thehousehold. Diaries properly filled out representedan accurate record of who was watching or lis-tening to a program at any time of the sevendays the record was kept. In addition, the diaryindicated the station to which the person wastuned and the name of the program.

The Interview ScheduleThe diaries kept in each household were sup-

plemented by a structured interview. Questionsfrom the schedule established whether or not thehousehold members owned a television set and/ora radio receiver in working order. In addition,general informational questions of a socio-eco-nomic and socio-cultural nature were asked. Thenature of the questions will be explained in latersections appropriate to each type of information.

Statistical ProceduresInformation obtained from the interview sched-

ules and diaries was coded and machine processedinto tables for analysis. Two statistical tests wereused to test the significance of the differences ob-served. The chi-square (X2) test was used to ana-lyze hypotheses relating to the importance ofmass media in obtaining different types of infor-mation. The analysis of variance test was usedto analyze the relation of various socio-economicfactors to mean listening and viewing times. Asignificance level of .05 was considered satisfac-tory for the type data being tested.

3For a discussion of rural population projections, seeAlvin L. Bertrand and Jack Wright, Jr., Louisiana's Hu-man Resources, Louisiana Agricultural Experiment Sta-tion Bulletin 583, June 1964.

4For a discussion of area probability and other samplingmethods, see Mrs. Laurel K. Sabrosky, "Sampling", Eval-uation in Extension, ed. Darcie Byrn (Topeka: H. M. Ives& Sons, Inc.), pp. 37-44.

5See: Gary A. Steiner, The People Look at TV, (NewYork: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1960), pp. 384-386.

TELEVISION VIEWING AND RADIO LISTENING PATTERNS OFHOUSEHOLD HEADS AND THEIR SPOUSES

Television Viewing PatternsIt is well known that television viewing pat-

terns are closely related to time of day. This issimply a function of the time most people haveavailable for viewing. These times, of course, varyfrom one day of the week to another, dependingon work and other habits. It is also true that sea-sonal variations occur, due to type of program-ming. These factors make it risky to talk of atypical television day. Nevertheless, it can besaid that the viewing patterns are typical of agiven audience at a given time of year. That iswhat is done here. All that is claimed is that Lou-isiana rural adults were characterized by the pat-terns described in the late spring of 1967. In thisregard, there is reason to believe that weekdaypatterns, at least, would be roughly the samethroughout the year. This would be true becauseof agricultural and other rural routines.

Seven charts were prepared to show the view-ing patterns of the household heads and theirspouses in the homes where interviews were con-ducted. These charts show the percentage of thetotal number of respondents watching T.V. at anygiven hour during the day for each day during anentire week. The trend line which joins the plottedpoints for each quarter hour interval forms aviewing curve. Such a curve is shown for males,females and the total sample population on eachchart. These curves are described in the followingdiscussions.

Weekday Viewing PatternsCharts on pages 7 through 10 show the week-

day viewing curves of the men and women in thesample population. Scrutiny of these charts in-dicates that certain patterns persist for each ofthe several weekdays. The regularity which thecurves display leads to the conclusion that thereare behavioral norms which can be identified andcatalogued. The first and most obvious of thesepatterns is that women make more use of tele-vision during the day than men. This, of course,is expected in terms of the relatively largeramount of time women spend in the home. How-ever, this pattern persists only until 5:30 p.m.From that time on, rural men tend to make upas large a television audience as rural women.The significance of the 5:30 hour seems to be the

6

national newscasts, which are common to moststations at this time.

A second pattern which is clear is that ruralLouisiana men tend to have a peak viewing timefrom 12:00 noon to 12:45 p.m. Women view ingreater numbers during these hours than duringmorning and afternoon periods, but in lessernumbers than men.

The evening weekday television viewing curvesdo not follow regular patterns, probably reflectingthe program preferences of the rural audience.On Mondays there is a peaking in the curve forboth men and women from 5:30 to 6:15 p.m. Af-ter this, there is a drop in viewers until 7:30 p.m.when viewing rises rapidly to a peak between8:30 and 8:45 p.m. After this peak, the audiencedrops off rapidly to about five per cent of theadult heads of households and their spouses at10:30 p.m. It is not altogether clear why there isa dip in viewing in the early evening. Two hypo-theses may be suggestedfarmers and their wivesare either eating supper or tending to otherchores. Early evening programming for youngerviewers also may have some influence.

The Tuesday viewing curves are similar to theMonday curves. The only difference is that thedip which occurs after the 6:15 hour is not asgreat. Also, it is interesting that the percentageof women in the evening audience is consistentlyhigher that the percentage of men until 10:30p.m. The only apparent reason for this is thatwomen had some program which appealed tothem during this hour.

Wednesday viewing is somewhat different fromboth Monday and Tuesday. There is a drop inviewing after 5:45 p.m. until 9:00 p.m. The per-centage of men and women viewers remains aboutthe same throughout the evening, showing moreloyalty for the remaining days of the week. Again,the explanation must fall back on programs. Inthis case, there seems to be such a strong appealthat supper time makes no difference.

Viewing curves for Thursday approach thosefor Wednesday, but do flatten with a slight dipbetween 5:30 and 8:45 p.m. At 9:00 p.m. there isa sharp rise in percentage of viewers which lastsonly 30 to 40 minutes.

Friday viewing ',ends to be more like Tuesdaypatterns than any other day. The only differenceis that the percentage of viewers is not as high

7

,r

AIL

8

AM.

during the evening hours. Women predominate inthe audience after 8:00 p.m.

One observation seems in order after inspectionof the plotted viewing curves. This is the fact thatthe rural adult television audience is not over-whelmingly attracted to the medium. At no timeduring the week did the percentage of potentialviewers in the interview sample watching tele-vision surpass 40 per cent. This fact suggestseither that farmers have only so much time forT.V., or are not especially drawn to the programsbeing shown. Daylight savings time may have in-fluenced this somewhat, allowing more time foroutside activities.

Comparison with the viewing patterns of ruralmen and women as determined some 10 years agoshows at least two interesting differences.° In thefirst place, no peaks in viewing occurred duringthe noon meal hour 10 years ago. Secondly, theevening viewing peaks 10 years ago were muchhigher reaching highs of around 90 per cent ofthe potential audience between 7:00 and 9:00 p.m.

10

No doubt T.V. was still a novelty at that time, andthe present curves represent a more normal pic-ture. It is tempting to predict that present pat-terns will persist until another innovation in-fringes on the present scene so as to drasticallyaffect viewing practices.

Saturday Viewing PatternThe difference in work routines on weekends

makes it advisable to study the use of televisionon Saturday and Sunday. Saturday customarilyis a day when rural people change their work rou-tine. In years past it was the day for shopping orvisiting, or the time one engaged in some type ofrecreation. The viewing curves for Saturday in-dicate that some of the same patterns persist, butthat television changes things somewhat. It ismost interesting that the patterns of viewing in-di"ate a very small viewing audience on Saturdaymorning until 12:00 noon. The percentages of in-

°Bertrand & Bates, op. en; pp 9,17.

11

terviewees viewing were considerably less on Sat-urday morning than for various weekdays. Also,the percentages of men and women were near thesame. Both these facts suggest some family ac-tivity which took adults out of the house. The au-dience begins to pick up at noon on Saturdaysand builds to a peak around 2:00 p.m. Interesting-ly, male viewers predominate over the female au-dience and continue to do so until 5:30 in theafternoon. This, no doubt, is a reflection on thefact that athletic events are shown on Saturdayafternoon television. Saturday night viewing be-gins to pick up at 6:00 p.m. and achieves a highpeak around 8:00 p.m. This audience is fairly wellsustained at close to 40 per cent of the potentialviewers until 10:00 p.m.

It is of interest that Saturday viewing patternshave not changed as much in 10 years as weekdaypatterns. The only important change is that theevening viewing audience on Saturday is nowsomewhat smallera factor related to the factthat television is no longer a novelty.

Sunday Viewing PatternsOne might expect more attention to television

on Sundays than on Saturdays. However, this doesnot seem to hold true. Although viewing curvesare higher on Sunday morning than on Saturdaymorning, they are lower Sunday afternoon andevening than on Saturdays at these times. Sun-day viewing tends to hit a low peak about 12:30p.m. and to continue at about 10 per cent of thepotential audience until around 7:00 p.m. Menpredominate in the audience until 7:00 p.m. Af-ter this, viewing rises sharply to more than 40per cent of the audience, then drops sharply after9:00 p.m.

Sunday viewing patterns have changed some-what over the past 10 years. For one thing, thereis more viewing on Sunday morning, a fact whichmay be associated with relaxed church attend-ance. For another, the audience included a largerpercentage of potiential viewers and extendedover a longer period of time in 1958. Both thesetrends are worthy of further exploration.

Radio Listening PatternsRadio, in many ways, has become the victim of

T.V. It is only at times and in places where thenecessary attention cannot be given to viewingthat radio tends to come into use. This fact is dra-matically illustrated in charts on pages 12 and 13,which portray the percentages of the total of

11

household heads and their spouses in the studypopulation who listen to radio at various hoursduring weekdays. Inspection of these charts quick-ly impresses one with the fact that radio comesinto its own only in the early morning. Apparent-ly, in the time from 6:30 a.m. until about 8:00a.m., members of the household do not turn totelevision as much as they do later. The col-lected data indicates there is seldom more thanthree or four per cent of the potential audiencelistening to radio after 8:00-9:00 a.m. Althoughdata in the charts do not show sex differences inradio listening, it seems safe to expect thatwomen make up the majority of this audience.

There is not much dift?rence in weekday andSaturday and Sunday radio listening. The differ-ence which appears seems to indicate a drop inlisteners on weekends.

The 20-year span from 1948 to 1968 has wit-nessed what might be termed the rise and fallof radio listening in rural areas of Louisiana. Atthe time of the earlier study, the listening curvesplotted showed farmers and their wives devotedthe time to radio that they now devote to tele-vision.% In fact, the curves show almost identicalpatterns, except that larger percentages of clientswere recorded for radio listeners 20 years agothan for T.V. viewers today. One other differenceis worth noting. The earlier radio audiences tend-ed to show a peak in the early morning hours,between 6:00 and 7:00 a.m., which is not shownon today's televsion viewing curve.

With regard to the drastic drop in radio listen-ing in Louisiana rural areas, not much more canbe said but that this is what may be expected inthe face of advancing technology. The same trendcan be noted whenever and wherever a new andimproved or a more popular practice encroacheson old ways.

The lesson for Extension and other agency per-sonnel attempting to reach rural audiences isquite clear. First, adjustments must be made inthe media used to reach farmers and homemakers.Second, programming must be done in light ofthe particular segment of the audience which willbe faithful to a particular medium. In other words,the old communications channels should be keptopen, but more thought and effort should be de-voted to television. The problem is one of bal-ance, both in terms of medium used and programformat and content.

7Bertrand and Hitt, op. cit, pp. 13-22.

4.0

' to

RADIO LISTENINGThe charts on these pages show the percentage of the total of household headsand their spouses in the study population who listen to radio at various hours during weekdays.

13

TIME DEVOTED TO TV VIEWING AND RADIO LISTENINGBY VARIOUS CLASSES OF RURALITES

This section is devoted to an analysis of thetime devoted to T.V. viewing and radio listening.In reviewing these findings, it should be remem-bered that there are factors other than the onestested which can and do influence the use of theseinstruments of communication. For instance, thetime of year this survey was takenMay, June,and July 1967could have made a difference.Television shows were beginning their summer re-runs and, for the first time since World War II,Louisiana had gone on daylight saving time. Thislatter factor meant more daylight time for out-door activities that could compete with the elec-tronic media. It is suspected that, if the surveyhad been conducted during the winter months, theabsence of these factors alone would have in-creased the mean viewing and listening times ofrespondents as well as the percentage of the pop-ulation paying attention to the media. However,it is doubted that there would have been muchdifference in radio listening times.

Other factors, such as the fact that many SouthLouisiana farmers who raised rice were at a timewhen they could leave their crops and go cn va-cation, also have relevance. In North Louisiana,truck and fruit farmers were engaged in harvestoperations and had to be at home.

In this regard, it may seem that this was a badtime of year to conduct the survey. However,the diversity of Louisiana rural enterprises issuch that almost any time of the year would havefound rural people engaged in distracting activi-ties.

Interestingly, the researchers found respondentsoriented more toward television than toward oth-er mass media. In fact, it was often difficult tomake respondents understand that it was just asimportant for them to keep the radio diary as itwas to keep the television diary. Some adults in-dirated that their children often turned on theradio in the house, but they (the adults) paidlittle attention to it

Color T.V. Increases Viewing TimeOf the 589 households where T.V. diaries were

kept, 48 (17 percent) were equipped with a colorset. This percentage is large enough to make pos-sible some generalizations with regard to relatedviewing time.

Analysis of the mean times devoted to tele-vision viewing between color television owners

14

and non-owners showed that owners of color setsdevoted significantly more time to watching tele-vision than did non-owners. Table 1 shows thatcolor set owners had a mean viewing time of 43hours and 15 minutes, while non-owners viewed31 hours and 21 minutes.

It will be noticed that only seventeen per centof the responding households owned color tele-vision. Why is there a significantly greater devo-tion to viewing among this small group?

One explanation could be that the more avidtelevision viewers are the first to buy such sets,feeling the additional expenditure is worth thepleasure they derive from it. Another explanationcould be that the additional dimension of colorin the picture makes the programs more enjoy-able and meaningful.**

This finding implies that the medium of tele-vision has found a way to further captivate itsviewing audience. It could be that the addition ofcolor to the medium has a novelty effect thatsoon will disappear, but it is more likely that themessages are strengethened by the added specious-ness. Persons seeking to reach rural audiencesthrough television or other visual means shouldtake advantage of this by presenting any films,slides or other visual material in color.

TABLE 1Mean Viewing Times of Color Television Set

Owners and Black and White TelevisionSet Owners

Type T.V. NumberPer Viewing Time**Cent (Hours-Minutes)

Black and WhiteColorTOTALS

24148

8317

31-2143-15

289 100

**Mean viewing time for all heads of households andspouses within category for one week.

*Because of the overshadowing effect of television overradio, it is felt that future studies of radio should be con-ducted separately from other mass media surveys. Thisdoes not mean the results of this survey are not valid,but merely that the data gathering processes would beeasier.

**After conducting experiments with viewers of blackand white and color T.V., Scanlon concluded the latter wasa more absorbing medium. His hypothesis was that colorchanges the emotional impact of T.V. and makes the viewermore of a participant and less of a viewer.

Women Spend More Time Watching T.V.Than Men

There was an almost even division of males andfemales included among household heads and theirspouses. A total of 288 females (52 per cent) and270 males (48 per cent) were included in the sam-ple population. Normally, one would expect wo-men to spend more time watching T.V. becausethey spend more time at home. However, thequestion of how much more time is an importantone. The diaries provided an answer to this ques-tion. For both television and radio, women werefound to devote more time to the media. Statis-tically, these findings were highly significant.(See Tables 2 and 3)

It was found that females had a mean weeklyviewing time of 19 hours and 33 minutes, whilemales had a mean weekly viewing time of 14hours and 49 minutes. From these data, it canbe concluded that rural women spend about 41/4more hours before the T.V. set than do rural meneach week. Reference to the charts showing view-ing times indicates this is mostly during morningand early afternoon hours as one would expect.It is of some import that women and men spendas much time as they do in this type activity.

A consistent remark made to interviewers byfemale respondents was: "I love my stories." Thismeant they were devoted to the daytime serialsseen during the week on television. Many womenseemed to have a possessive, personal feeling aboutthe serials.

TABLE 2Mean Viewing Times by Sex

Per Viewing Time*Sex Number Cent (Hours-Minutes)

Male 270 48 14-49Female 288 52 19-33TOTALS 558 100

*Mean viewing time for all heads of households andspouses within category for one week.

TABLE 3Mean Listening Times by Sex

Per Listening Time*Sex Number Cent (Hours-Minutes)

Male 259 48 2-22Female 277 52 440TOTALS 536 100

Income Does Not Significantly AffectT.V. Viewing and Radio Listening

Statistical association of income with viewingand listening times indicated that this factor isnon-significant. From this finding it can be con-cluded that income groups should not be con-sidered too strongly when using these media toreach rural audiences. The use of T.V. and radiois fairly homogenous at all income levels.

It is noteworthy, as seen in Table 4, that thelowest mean viewing time was in the highest in-come category, while the highest mean viewingtime was in the income bracket just below it.

TABLE 4Mean Viewing Times by Income

Income NumberPer Viewing TimeCent (Hours-Minutes)

Under $3,000 89 16 17-53$3,001 - $6,000 161 29 17-8$6,001 - $9,000 148 26 17-43$9,001 - $12,000 99 18 18-29Over $12,000 61 11 13-34TOTALS 558 100


Table 5 shows that the lowest income group hadthe highest mean listening time for radio. Thiscould be attributed to a group that did not owntelevision and suggests further research to com-pare radio listening in television families to radiolistening in non-television familes.

It is probable that intervening variables suchas age and education are operative in connectionwith income. At any rate, more study of thistheory seems in order.

TABLE 5Mean Listening Times by Income

Income NumberPer Listening Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)

Under $3,000 84 16 4-37$3,001 - $6,000 156 29 3-19$6,001 - $9,000 142 27 3-19$9,001 - $12,000 93 17 3-10Over $12,000 61 11 3-52TOTALS 536 100

*Mean listening time for all heads of households and *Mean listening time for all heads of households andspouses within category for one week. spouses within category for one week.

15

The Young and the Old are the MostAvid T.V. and Radio Fans

Another factor found to be statistically signifi-cant in the amount of time rural persons devoteto radio and television was age. It should be notedthat, in both media, the youngest and the oldestrespondents were the heaviest users. This can beseen in Table 6 and Table 7.

Since there was a small number of respondentsin the youngest age category (four), this groupcannot be considered significant. Therefore, itshould be concluded that older persons are hea-vier users of electronic media.

The implication of this finding is that older per-sons not only have more time to devote to thesemedia, but also are able to use them as a sourceof entertainment. It is obvious that older personsare retired and/or have fewer household andfamily responsibilities.

TABLE 6Mean Viewing Times by Age

Age NumberPer Viewing Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)

16 - 20 4 1 37-4521 - 25 23 4 16-4626 - 35 85 15 16-2436 - 45 173 31 16-1546 - 55 134 24 16-4156 - 65 89 16 18-3866 & Older 48 9 20-0TOTALS 556 100


TABLE 7Mean Listening Times by Age

Age NumberPer Listening Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)

16 - 20 4 1 16-3721 - 25 22 4 4-2526 - 35 81 15 4-3536 - 45 165 31 3-1546 - 55 133 25 3-1456 - 65 87 16 1-5066 & Older 43 8 5-30TOTALS 535 100

*Mean listening time for all heads of households andspouses within category for one week.

Education Does Not Significantly AffectViewing and Listening Time

The education of respondents was not relatedsignificantly to the time they spent watching tele-vision and listening to the radio. It can be con-

16

eluded that the use of these devices cuts acrossall levels of education among rural persons inLouisiana, but it is perhaps for different reasonsand purposes.

The implication of the above finding is that theeducational level of presentation of radio andtelevision messages must be about right, or thatthere is enough variety to satisfy persons withall levels of education. If all messages were de-signed for a specific educational level, it is prob-able that significant differences would have beennoted in the answers of respondents. The meanviewing and listening time by educational groupsare shown in Tables 8 and 9.

TABLE 8Mean Viewing Times by Education

Education NumberPer Viewing Time*

Cent (Hours-Minutes)

None 17 3 18-321- 4 Years 27 5 16-585 - 8 Years 117 21 18-41- 3 H.S. 87 16 16-19H.S. Grad. 199 36 16-331+ College 106 19 17-50TOTALS 553 100


TABLE 9Mean Listening Times by Education

Education NumberPer Listening Time*


None 16 3 1-41- 4 Years 27 5 2-325 - 8 Years 120 22 3-411- 3 H.S. 79 15 3-0H.S. Grad. 190 36 3-541+ College 100 19 3-52TOTALS 532 100


Social Participation and T.V. Viewing andRadio Listening are Related

One of the most interesting findings of thisstudy was the association of listening and view-ing times with social participation. Only in radiolistening was this difference found to be statis-tically significant. Nevertheless, a trend can beseen in the data for television viewing.

In Table 10 it can be seen that the higher thesocial participation score, the less time respon-dents devote to watching television. Table 11

r7

shows that the higher the amount of social partic-ipation, the greater the mean radio listening timeof respondentg.

TABLE 10Mean Viewing Times by Social Participation

Participation NumberPer Viewing Time*


Low 177 32 18-31Medium 170 30 17-8High 209 38 16-21TOTALS 556 100


TABLE 11,Mean Listening Times by Social Participation

SocialParticipation Number

Per Listening Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)



Social participation scores were arrived at inthe following mariner. One point was assigned foreach organization to which a head of householdor spouse belonged. Another point was given ifthe person was an officer. If he attended regular-ly, he was assigned two points. If he attendedsometimes, he was assigned one point. No pointswere assigned if the respondent indicated he neverattended.

Social participation scores were determinedwhen the data was compiled, and the same scorewas assigned to the head of household and to thespouse. This was considered to be a "family" so-cial participation score. If these persons receivedzero to three points for social participation, theywere placed in the low social participation group.If they had four to seven points, they were placedin the medium group, and if they had eight ormore points, they were placed in the high socialparticipation group.

Level of Living is not Significant in T.V.Viewing and Radio Listening

Level of living was not statistically insignificantas a factor in radio listening and T.V. viewing. Itcan be concluded from the data in Tables 12 and13 that level of living makes little difference inthe amount of time Louisiana ruralites listen to

17

radio or watch television. Again there may be in-tervening variables which account for this pat-tern. Said another way, one person in a givenhigh or low socio-economic level might view ornot view for different reasons than a person inanother economic level.

To arrive at a level of living score, respondentswere asked if they had certain convenience itemsin their homes. These included car, running water(cold), running water (hot), telephone, automaticdishwasher, home freezer, air conditioner, centralheating, clothes dryer and electric blanket. Re-spondents were also asked to indicate the numberof rooms in the house, not counting baths andclosets. By visual observation, interviewers de-termined the type of exterior construction of thehouse and whether or not it was in good repair.

Level of living scores were determined whenthe data was compiled, with the same score beingassigned to the head of household and spouse.One point was assigned for each convenience itemin the house. If it had two rooms or less, no pointswere assigned. For three to five rooms, the samplewas assigned one point, and for six or more rooms,two points. Three points were given for brickexterior construction, two for wood siding, andone for asbestos siding. If the house was in goodcondition, two points were assigned. One pointwas given if the house was in fair condition andno points if it was in poor condition.

TABLE 12Mean Viewing Times by Level of Living

Level of Living NumberPer Viewing Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)



TABLE 13Mean Listening Times by Level of Living

Level of Living NumberPer Listening Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)



If respondents received zero to 10 points forlevel of living, they were placed in a low level ofliving category. If they received 11 to 12 points,they were placed in the medium level category,and if they received thirteen or more points, theywere placed in the high level of living category.

Negroes Devote More Time to Radio aidT.V. than Whites

The race of respondents was found to be relatedsignificantly into the amount of time they devotedto viewing television and to listening to the radio.Using the information shown on Table 14 and onTable 15, it can be concluded that Negro ruralresidents devote more time to viewing televisionand listening to radio than do white residents.

Why the above should be true is open to fur-ther research. It is probable that Negroes do notshare the affluence of whites and do not partici-pate in as many outside activities. In this senseradio and T. V. could be more of a recreationaloutlet for the Negro.

TABLE 14Mean Viewing Times by Race

Per Viewing Time*Race Number Cent (Hours-Minutes)

White 480 86 16-48Non-White 76 14 20-20TOTALS 556 100


TABLE 15Mean Listening Times by Race

RacePer Listening Time*

Number Cent (Hours-Minutes)

White 459 86 3-15Non-White 77 14 5-25TOTALS 536 100


Reading and Radio Listening are SignificantlyAssociated, But Reading and T.V. are Not

The amount of reading material received intothe homes of respondents was significantly re-lated to time devoted to radio listening, but not

18

to television viewing. This finding raises some in-teresting speculations. It can be suggested thatpersons having large amounts of reading materialavailable devote more time to listening to radio,possibly because they read and listen at the sametime. It also may be that these persons are morediscriminating as T. V. viewers.

To determine the amount of reading materialgoing into the home, respondents were asked toindicate the number of daily newspapers, the num-ber of weekly newspapers, the number of farmmagazines and the number of other publicationsgoing into the home. All regularly received pub-lications, including religious newspapers, weretaken into account. Scores were assigned with onepoint for each publication going into the home.When compiling the data, respondents were againplaced in categories of low, medium and high. Re-spondents reporting zero to two publications wereplaced in the low category. Those reporting threeto six publications were placed in the mediumcategory and those reporting seven or more pub-lications were placed in the high category. Scoreswere assigned to both the head of household andspouse.

TABLE 16Mean Viewing Times by Arne, tad of Reading

Material Received in Households

Reading Material NumberPer Viewing Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)



TABLE 17Mean Listening Times by Amount of Reading

Material Received in Households

Reading Material NumberPer Listening Time*Cent (Hours-Minutes)



THE MOST IMPORTANT M ASS MEDIA SOURCES OFHOMEMAKING, AGRICULTURAL AND NEWS INFORMATIONEach interviewee was asked to name the most

important mass media source of certain types ofinformation for the adult members of his or herhousehold. The four scources from which a choicewas allowed were T.V., radio, newspapers andmagazines. Interviewers reported some difficultyin forcing respondents to make one choice amongthe four media. However, once it was explainedthat the response, needed was one medium over allothers, which adult members of the household feltwas the most important, respondents seemed tohave little difficulty in giving an answer.

The types of information tested included home-making ideas, agricultural practices, local news,and national and international news. Responsesrelating to each are discussed in turn.

The Most Important Source forHomemaking Information

It was expected that a high percentage of re-spondents would list magazines as the most im-portant source of homemaking information. Thefact that almost as large a number of respondentsindicated television as magazines was somewhatof a surprise. This strong inclination toward tele-vision as a source of homemaking informationprobably is attributable to the local homemakingshows produced by television stations throughoutthe state. Several respondents indicated duringinterviews that they watched homemaking pro-grams and could identify Extension Service per-sonnel who appeared on them regularly. Table 18shows the percentages of informants naming thevarious mass media they considered most import-ant for homemaking information.

TABLE 18Most Important Sources for Various Types of

Information by Percentage of RuralLouisiana Respondents

Type ofInformation

SOURCES OF INFORMATIONTotalPerCentNo. T.V. Radio

News.papers

Maga-zines

Homemaking 288 41 7 10 42 100

Agriculture 273 29 16 13 42 100

Local News 299 45 25 30 100

National & 297 84 6 9 1 100

Int. News

The implication of the above findings is thatExtension agents and others concerned withreaching rural audiences with homemaking in-

19

formation should continue and perhaps expandthe work they are doing on television. Eventhough magazines rank slightly higher than tele-vision as a source of homemaking news, it wouldbe much harder to work through a regional ornational publication of this type than through alocal television station.

Further study could be done in this area todetermine the subject matter homemakers wouldlike to see on these television shows. Some workalso could be done to determine how much home-making information is retained by the audience.

Since. Extension agents already are doing exten-sive homemaking information work on radio andin newspapers, a re-evaluation of this work interms of its effectiveness in reaching the ruralpopulation might be in order. It must be remem-bered that the results of this survey do not in-dicate that the present work is not effective, butsimply that it is not considered as important asource as television and magazines.

The Most Important Source forAgricultural Information

The high ranking which magazines received asthe most important source of agricultural infor-mation was predictable. Many farm publicationsare specialized and are circulated to persons in-terested in one or another specialty crop. Seetable 1.

It was surprising that television ranked as highas it did as an important source of agriculturalinformation. There was only one television showin the state devoted strictly to agricultural news.Other stations devote segments of various showsto agricultural information. No doubt, the timedevoted to agricultural information on televisionis having some impact on rural residents.

Extension Service agents who have tradition-ally placed emphasis on radio and newspaper me-dia should not be greatly distressed by these find-ings as they are indicative of the total rural popu-lation and not solely the farm clientele. However,there is an implication for agents who wish to domass media work in rural non-farm areas. Infact, one implication of this study is that morework should be done on television to reach moreof the rural population.

Later studies could determine who is seekinginformation and what kinds of agricultural infor-

r.

mation is being sought through mass media chan-nels. Efforts also could be made tJ determine whyradio and newspapers ranked significantly lowerin importance than magazines and even televisionas an important source of information.

Again, it must be remembered that the re-sponses do not mean the source is the most ac-curate, the most comprehensive, or the quickest.It merely means it is considered the most import-ant by the respondent. In this regard, it is inter-esting to learn that national news magazines are

not penetrating into rural areas of Louisiana.In view of this finding, and the fact that rural

viewers consider television the most importantsource of local news, one may suggest that tele-vision stations would profit by devoting more airtime to broadcasting local news rather than re-peating news that already has been given by thenetworks. More research in this area could de-termine the feasibility of such a change, bothfrom the standpoint of the stations and the pros-pective audience.

Louisiana State Universityand

Agricultural and Mechanical College

Cooperative Extension ServiceJohn A. Cox, Director

ERIC Clearinghouse

SEP1 2 1972

on Adult Education

In cooperation with the United States Department of Agriculture. Distributedance of the Acts of Congress of May 8 and June 30, 1914.

Coop. Ext. Pub. 1631 2/71 (3M)

in further-

A 2

document resume ac 012 800 darden, douglas w.; bertrand ... · ed 067 526. document resume. 08. ac...

Documents