The average American spends more time using media devices than any other activity, according to a Ball State University media study unveiled Monday in New York.
The Middletown Media Studies 2, conducted by researchers from the Center for Media Design (CMD), was introduced as part of Media Magazine's Forecast 2006 program. At least 200 people attended the morning presentation, which revealed that the average adult spends nine hours per day consuming a variety of mass media.
"If you are a student studying media this is important because it will show how ordinary people interact with 15 different kinds of media," Mike Bloxham, CMD director of testing and assessment, said.
Some common media devices studied include television, radio, iPods, books, the Internet, magazines, instant messaging, e-mail and cell phones.
The research team consisted of Bloxham, Robert Papper, telecommunications professor; Mark Popovich, journalism professor; and Michael Holmes, communication studies professor.
The CMD used 200 people from Delaware County and 200 people from Indianapolis to conduct the study. Using a diverse population and a larger market added strength to this study, Bloxham said.
"This is a good test bay as it is relative to the norms," Bloxham said. "It's an ideal representation of most of the country and mass-market America."
Researchers conducted and analyzed data for 5,000 hours of media use. The data were recorded every 15 seconds.
This study was a follow up to a 2004 study that found people consume twice as much media as previously thought.
In 2004, media use was under-reported, with 60 percent less recorded than what was actually being used, Bloxham said.
"We decided not to use phone surveys or diaries because it was useless when using more than one medium," he said.
Researchers were not surprised by the findings, but the data does reinforce the findings of 2004, Mark Ransford, University Communications Media Relations Manager, said.
One of the research's key findings was that about 30 percent of an average day was spent with media as the sole activity versus 20.8 percent for work activity. An additional 39 percent of the day was spent with media while involved in some other activity. Television remained the dominant medium, with the average American spending about 241 minutes daily watching television. The computer has emerged as the second most used media device daily at 120 minutes. People ages 18 to 24 spend less time online than any other age group except those older than 65.
Every month, researchers will release one white paper, or a report that examines the data more closely.
"When working with major advertising agencies they will be amazed by the data +â-óGé¼" especially by breaking it down into markets," Ransford said.
He said that the study will give Ball State a lot of publicity.
"We are in quite high hopes," Bloxham said. "It is going to generate awareness on a large scale, and bring attention to the university. We are anticipating quite a lot of buzz off the back of this."
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