Families No Longer Watch TV Together

According to experts at the University of Gothenburg, in Sweden, people are becoming increasingly individualistic in their habits, and this is also reflected in TV viewing habits. Once upon a time, the entire family used to gather in front of the set, and spend a comfortable evening with each other, commenting the events of the day and watching their favorite shows. However, it would now appear that this type of social interaction is fading away, as each of us tends to keep hold of our preferences, and not submit to requests by others to change the channel, ScienceDaily reports.

“We are becoming more and more individualistic also in our choice of TV programs,” UG expert Jakob Bjur said in his dissertation paper for the university's Department of Journalism, Media, and Communication. He also revealed that some of the most common occurrences, such as large groups of people watching roughly the same TV shows, and then talking about them at work the next day, were also disappearing slowly but surely. The new model rising is that of several rooms featuring their own TVs, with family members watching their favorite programs alone.

Additionally, Bjur discovered, the large variety of programs and TV stations available at the moment also had an effect on lunchtime conversations. Very few people found at that point common grounds in this type of discussions, he argued. “In 1999 social viewing, watching together, accounted for 45 percent, and in 2008 it was down to 37 percent. We are becoming more and more individualistic also in our TV choices, and I'm convinced that this trend will continue. We can no longer speak of TV as a social adhesive, a unifying force,” he argued in his dissertation.

The audiences were also fragmented and niched, the expert said. This is a direct side-effect of massive competition between TV stations. Rather than working on quality programs to attract audiences, networks chose to differentiate their programs from those of other companies by adopting various niches. This also promotes the economic interests of advertisers, which can now more easily target various types of TV stations and programs specifically. It is highly unlikely to find dog-food ads on a channel dealing with the latest fashion collections. Conversely, animal-oriented channels rarely feature ads of detergents and washing soaps.