Adolescent Motivations for Reality Television Viewing: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

With the recent growth of reality television programing and its appeal to adolescent viewers, marketers, advertisers, and public policy experts need to understand what motivations drive adolescents to watch reality programs. By understanding adolescent viewer motivations, professionals will be able to craft effective marketing strategies and develop public policy programs for improving the welfare of adolescents. This research involves an exploratory study that examines adolescents' motivations for watching reality programs through a content analysis of free-response data from a national sample of 800 adolescents in the United States, members of a Harris Online panel. Theoretical, managerial, and public policy implications of the findings are discussed. C 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.Reality television programing has become a significant and successful genre for television schedulers for the last several years. Among the most watched programs on television today are reality programs such as American Idol and Dancing with the Stars (Nielsen Media Research, 2011). Reality television differs from the majority of other television programs in that a reality program is "unscripted program(s) that shows real people, not actor nor athletes, active in a specific environment" (Mead, 2005, p. 3). In fact, four of the five most watched broadcast television programs in 2010 were reality programs (Nielsen Media Research, 2010 (Harris Interactive Youth Query, 2006) found that adolescents watched a broad spectrum of reality programs. For example, 70% of teens watched Fear Factor, 67% watched American Idol, and 40% watched Survivor. With the number of hours spent in front of the television set increasing 6% over the last five years (Nielsen Media Research, 2009), and the reality programing genre steadily growing, adolescents are more likely to watch reality programs.The high percentage of adolescents who watch reality television (Harris Interactive Youth Query, 2006) implies that many teens are, at least to some extent, familiar with the events and participants in the shows. Because of the influences of reality television on adolescents' behaviors and habits, such as shopping (Shrum, 1999), it becomes vital to investigate the popularity of reality television with adolescent viewers. This research involves an exploratory study the objective of which is to examine the motivations that drive adolescents to watch reality programing. The findings suggest theoretical insights that would inform hypothesis development in future studies. Additionally, insights that would be helpful to practitioners and policymakers are offered. For example, identifying the motivational factors that impact an adolescent's choice of a reality program will assist network programers and advertisers to make more audience appropriate decisions with respect to product placements and other media strategies (Cowley & Barron, 2008). Product placements, for instance, could feature products that are most likely to appeal to the needs that the program's v...

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