Audience Analysis of FRIENDS

Audience analysis research of the show Friends began with the reading of Stefan Herrmann’s article Do we learn to ‘read’ television like a kind of ‘language. This article led me to take a closer look at the reality of television viewing attitudes and the truth about Herrmann’s statement, “Televisual codes constitute a kind of ‘language’, and we all learn how to interpret signs and symbols in order to put meaning to what we see” (Herrmann). Thus, this study was conducted to broaden the understanding of television's influence in our everyday life.

I decided to construct a survey in performing this study. I chose this method because it was the best way for me to obtain the reactions of large number of participants. The survey is a small, non-randomized one and it lacks professionalism since it did not go through the process of validation, but was good enough in acquiring the answer for my research. See for details.

The results were very interesting in that there was a high level of agreement among the participants on their opinions of the show Friends. With the completion of the survey, I organized what was in my hand and came up with an analysis that was quite different from what I have expected. I came to conclude that people do not ‘read’ television, as suggested by Herrmann, and here is why I had to give it an unexpected conclusion. See for details.