A2 Media Unit G324

1. Soap Opera Genre –
Target Audience
Name: Zakary Winsall
Candidate Number: 2144
Center Name: St. Andrew’s Catholic School
Center Number: 64135
OCR Media Studies – A2 Level
Unit G324: Advanced Portfolio

2. Hartley’s 7 Subjectivities - The stereotypical target audience for soap operas according to Hartley would be females, from the
ages of 16+. This is because females may become more emotionally attached with the drama in the soap opera, which is not
stereotypical of the male gender, which is possibly why they are not so interested in soap operas. However the male gender is also
drawn to watch soap operas because of family life, however they may also be drawn in to relate to the tough male characters present in
the soap. It’s common that in the evening’s a family will sit down together to watch a soap, and this is the reason why men can be
drawn into watching them. According to Rebecca Feasey’s ‘Masculinity and Popular Television’ (2007) she states how the genre focuses
on “The home, the family, domestic tribulations and the strong women, and as such, it has been long been said to appeal to a female
viewer”, she believes in this case that the female gender are the stereotypical audience for a soap opera genre. This was supported by
research by Dr. Aaliya Ahmed from Kashmir University, India, who stated that “soaps in general have a predominately female audience”
(http://www.ijsrp.org/research_paper_jun2012/ijsrp-June-2012-47.pdf).
Socio-Economic Needs - According to the socio-economic needs, the stereotypical audience for a soap opera is most likely
people who are in the social grading of B-D. This because the issues that are raised in these soap operas are consistent to what is
actually found in the real world. Therefore the viewers are able to relate better to these issues, because they are technically directly
involved. As the intended audience is British, we like to see the realism and struggle that comes with everyday life, and the class that
possibly struggles the most is grade D because they are the working class, the manual labourers and unskilled workers.
Stereotypical Target Audience

3. Katz’s Uses and Gratifications Theory – According to Katz, the stereotypical audience may ‘personally identify’ with the
issues raised within the soap. This may cause them to want to become like the characters who are portrayed or may realise that they do
not want to be like them at all and steer clear of those personalities and characteristics.
However I can also be argued that the audience may watch soaps for pure ‘entertainment’. They want their time in the evening to
simply just relax and to escape for the real world, and their real problems to instead watch the problems of the characters in the soap
that they are watching.
Psychographics – The stereotypical lifestyle of the audience of soap operas according to the lifestyle scale is most likely a
‘reformer’ because they are the people who have the awareness of the general community and normal, everyday life. The audience is
going to have a very mundane, and normal life because they are normal people. They will most likely be in school or at work. Due to
watching these soap operas, they may feel the need or be pressured into making similar lifestyle choices as shown in the soap.
These soap operas are usually scheduled between the times of 7pm and 9pm, this is the prime time TV because the watershed is at
9pm where more violence and usage of profanity can be used as by this time most children would have gone to bed.
(http://ask.ofcom.org.uk/help/television/watershed).