P2

1. Research
Samuel Johnson

2. Terminology
• Circulation
– How many copies of a product have been distributed
around the world
• Hits
– How many times a particular webpage has been looked at
• Box Office Figures
– How much money a film makes from cinema viewings
• Ratings
– How something is rated from good to bad e.g. 5/10
• Sales
- How many products have been sold overall

3. Primary Research
• Definition
– Research you do by yourself, hands on with the public.
• Advantages
– You know every answer that was given, because you were there asking
the questions, whereas secondary research may not be entirely true.
• Disadvantages
– Finding the courage to go up and ask the general public some questions
can be hard for some people, as they may lack the social skills to do so.
However if you eventually do go and ask questions to the general public
another problem arises, getting a good enough range of people for a
survey can take a really long time.
• Examples
- Survey
- Questionnaire
- Vox pops

4. Secondary Research
• Definition
– Using research already out there, in your work.
• Advantages
– You don’t have to bother spending your time finding the research yourself.
– There usually are a wide range of resources available.
• Disadvantages
– The existing research may not be entirely accurate, therefore is not valid
for research purposes.
– Finding the exact research already out there linked to your work, may be a
challenge.
• Example
– Internet research
– Library research
– Archive research

5. Quantitative Research
• Definition
– Research that can be expressed as a quantity, through percentages,
fractions and numbers.
• Advantages
– Allows for easily interpreted research to made, as usually all the
questions asked are yes or no based, therefore no opinions have to
be given or written down. Furthermore the answers given can be
displayed through a simple chart, such as a bar chart.
• Disadvantages
- No reasoning behind the answers are given as all the questions
are yes or no based. Therefore everything is quite lacklustre.
• Example
- Box office profit
- YouTube views
- Film rating

6. Qualitative Research
• Definition
- Research that goes into more depth than quantitative research, asking why
someone gave a particular answer rather than just a yes/no question.
• Advantages
- Finding out someone's opinion gives you access to more information to
include in your research (making It more informative and thorough), not just a
long dull list of yes/no answers.
• Disadvantages
- The time it takes to ask random members of the public questions, involving
their whole hearted opinion on why they chose that particular answer will
take a far longer time than quantitative.
• Example
- Movie reviews
- Chat show
- Game reviews

7. Audience Research
• Definition
- Finding out information, on what kind of people consume a particular product.
• Advantages
- It would be pointless creating a product, if its not going to appeal to the right people.
Therefore through audience research, you can find out first hand and in person if an
audience actually likes or dislikes your product, plus constructive criticism from a
group of people will enable you to work on and improve your product, for the target
audience.
• Disadvantages
- If you were to present your product in front of an audience before a movie,
you may get very similar positive and negative feedback, as the people in
their seats are watching a particular genre of film therefore they are all alike
in that aspect; giving you not much to work with. However if you actually
gather an audience that are mixed in terms of what they like and dislike, you
are going to find it frustratingly hard to appeal to everyone with the feedback
being very different for each individual and you can’t possibly appeal to
everyone.
• Example
– Questionnaires
– Surveys
– Tally charts
– Constructive criticisms

8. Market Research
• Definition
- Finding out about the market place where a product is sold
• Advantages
- Market research gives you an opportunity to know your competitors well and understand their
strengths and weaknesses. Furthermore this method enables you to better understand how customers
within a particular target market behave, their behaviours affect the growth and the profitability of a
trade. It is good to know what customers like and products they don’t first hand.
• Disadvantages
- Conducting the research yourself takes a lot of time, finding out what paying customers like and dislike
can seem intrusive to some, therefore they may not even cooperate with you. Furthermore to save time
you may hire other people to carry out the research for you, but this can be a costly process; so you
have to weight out your options. Secondly a biased population of paying customers can leave you with
poorly formulated, inaccurate feedback to put on your spreadsheet, therefore you are left with no
better understanding of whether your product is going to sell anywhere else. This leads to more
research being conducted in other market places, further increasing the cost and using up valuable
time.
• Example
- Surveys
- Questionnaires
- Focus groups

9. Production Research
• Definition
- Finding Information and resources required to create a piece of media
• Advantages
- You can do crucial research by yourself or with a team, without the need to interact with other random
members of the public to gather information. You spend your time solely researching to improve on
your piece of media, therefore there is no excuse for delay as there would be when performing market
or audience research. Furthermore you do the research to appeal to your target audience, whereas the
general public have all sorts of different interests and attitudes, therefore there is no need to waste
your valuable time finding a specific group of people out in a public area.
• Disadvantages
- Doing the research and then creating the product without any feedback is pointless. Without
interacting with the general public you will receive 0 feedback before your product is released. You may
want to appeal to a certain audience, however you also don’t not want to appeal to everyone else
therefore without any criticism your product may be a complete failure because you didn’t take into
account what anyone would say. Furthermore production research restricts you from interacting with
other people, a computer screen can’t tell you if a product is good and neither can your team, as they
are most likely going to be biased towards your product. Therefore you should go outside and ask real
peoples opinions to make your product more appealing.
• Example
– The internet
– Books
– investment

10. Terminology
• Objective
– Research that has not been influenced by your own
opinions and beliefs
• Subjective
– Research that has been influenced by your own opinions
and beliefs
• Valid
– Whether the proposed research is able to correctly
understand/identify the intended result
• Reliable
- Research that is consistently accurate

11. Harvard Referencing
Name of the film/book being researched;
1. Michael Crichton (1991) Jurassic Park
http://www.rareresource.com/jurassic-park.htm
2. Frank Darabont (1994) The Shawshank Redemption
http://www.filmsite.org/shaw.html
3. Mel Gibson (2016) Hacksaw Ridge
http://hacksawridge.independent.co.uk
4. Ernest Cline (2011) Ready Player One
https://www.shmoop.com/ready-player-one/summary.html
5. Stanley Kubrick (1980) The Shining
http://www.filmsite.org/shin.html