The Times Audience

Question 1

How does The Times appeal to its target audience through its content?

Answer 1

By including both hard and soft news items, such as detailed political reporting and lifestyle supplements like ‘times2’.

Question 2

What is the primary target audience of The Times according to ABC data?

Answer 2

Predominantly ABC1, over 35, with a liberal/right-wing political stance.

Question 3

How does The Times’ digital format cater to its audience’s preferences?

Answer 3

By launching an edition-based digital format that closely resembles the print format and is updated three times a day.

Question 4

What theoretical perspective explains how newspapers shape audience views through repeated patterns of representation?

Answer 4

Cultivation theory by Gerbner.

Question 5

What is Gerbners Cultivation theory?

Answer 5

• the idea that exposure to repeated patterns of representation over long periods of time can shape and influence the way in which people perceive the world around them (i.e. cultivating particular views and opinions)
• the idea that cultivation reinforces mainstream values (dominant ideologies).

Question 6

How can Gerbner be applied to The Times?

Answer 6

People with an already right wing ideology will have this view heightened

Question 7

What is the impact of The Times’ use of formal language and detailed text on its audience?

Answer 7

It appeals to a well-educated and middle-class audience that values in-depth analysis and detailed information.

Question 8

How does The Times’ content reflect the needs of its ABC1 audience demographic?

Answer 8

By providing detailed, informative reporting on national and global affairs that engage a well-educated and middle-class audience.

Question 9

What is Shirkys end of audience theory?

Answer 9

• the idea that the Internet and digital technologies have had a profound effect on the relations between media and individuals
• the idea that the conceptualisation of audience members as passive consumers of mass media content is no longer tenable in the age of the Internet, as media consumers have now become producers who ‘speak back to’ the media in various ways, as well as
  creating and sharing content with one another.

Question 10

How does The Times conform to Shirkys theory?

Answer 10

By allowing readers to comment on stories, share their opinions, and engage with content in real-time.