Interview Evaluation

Interview Evaluation

“Do the social activities in Banstead appeal to you as a teenager? Why?”

My first question asked the interviewee if they felt that the social activities in Banstead appealed to them particularly as a teenager; to which he replied with no due to the fact that it is a more family environment targeting families with young children. This highlights the fact that the facilities in Banstead have not targeted towards teenagers, only families with young children. This supports my general idea that teenagers do not feel as if Banstead is an age appropriate location for them to socialise.

“What type of social activities do you think there should be that would interest teenagers?”

After asking my interviewee what type of social activities Banstead could introduce that would interest teenagers, my interviewee responded with internet/social cafes, arcades, skate parks and shops that teenagers often buy from. These shops can include New Look, H&M and Topshop; teenagers will be attracted to these due to them being lower priced shops. These different activities can target both male and females.

“Do you feel that the lack of activities available can result in teenagers resorting to criminal behaviour, e.g. vandalism and drugs?”

I asked my interviewee if whether or not they felt that the lack of activities available could result in criminal behaviour, to which he replied with “Yes”. He also stated that he felt that teenagers could resort to this behaviour seeing as there is no other alternative (e.g. social clubs or arcades) for what a teenager can do; given that teenagers will be more likely to give in to peer pressure especially if they feel as if they have not got anything ‘better’ or ‘more important’ to do.

“Have you personally witnessed teenage drug use in your local area? (Banstead)”

I asked my interviewee this question as I wanted to see if someone else, apart from myself, had witnessed teenagers using drugs. As a response to this question, my interviewee said he had witnessed teenagers on a number of different occasions smoking cannabis in the local park. This provides me with substantial evidence that there could potentially be more witnesses of this particular behaviour; without assuming why these teenagers took drugs, this could highlight the suggestion that teenagers, apart from the lack of social activities, may be using drugs to escape from stressful situations as home life. Referring back to my secondary research where I found that there were a significant number of single parent families living in Banstead, teenagers of these families may feel upset from these situations.

“Do you believe that there is a link between teenage drug use and home issues?”

After asking my interviewee this question, they responded with “Yes”. They felt strongly about this question as they firmly believed that children and teenagers do feel stress and pressured from home life issues which then impacts their behaviour outside of home; at this point teenagers, may look for something to look forward to outside of home (e.g. activities or even jobs to take their mind off that stress at home) which could then leave them with no choice but to resort to criminal behaviour at some times. 

Written Report

Written Report

The purpose of my research revolves around finding the different types of activities that Banstead has to offer for teenagers who live there and how applicable they are to teenagers. Therefore, I plan to do my own documentary researching in to the different views and opinions of the lack of opportunities.

I conducted primary research using a range of different methods, firstly I created my own questionnaire, as it was a quick and easy method of gaining responses from a large amount of people, asking participants to rate the social activities in Banstead out of 10 and whether or not they are appealing to teenagers. Giving out questionnaires also provided me with the opportunity for respondents to list if they believe that the lack of social opportunities can lead to an increase in crime rate, to which the majority of the respondents said yes. Here are examples of a couple of my questions:

Do you believe that the lack of activities has/could lead to the increase in criminal activity?

Overall, 80% (8) people who answered my questionnaire had responded with ‘Yes’, whereas 20%, who represent the other 2 respondents, have answered ‘No’. This suggests that most people are convinced that the lack of social activities in Banstead can lead to an increase in criminal activity, especially as there are less considered activities for teenagers.

And

Do you feel that the attractions in Banstead are appealing to teenagers?

Another example of a question from my questionnaire is asking respondents whether that they feel that the attractions in Banstead are appealing to teenagers or not. The majority of the respondents, which is the 70%, responded with no. However, the rest of the 30% responded with yes although the majority of responses still suggests that my target audience believe that the attractions are not ideal for teenagers and should introduce more types of social activities. The questionnaire results enabled me to have a more direct approach when conducting my interview, such as the interviewees opinion on Banstead’s social and job opportunities and transport.

Secondly, I conducted a face to face interview with a teenager who does live in Banstead. This interview enabled me to ask a range of questions about what the interviewee’s opinions are on of whether or not the activities apply to her age group and whether or not if different social activities could be introduced. Through having a face to face interview this enabled me to obtain personal responses and opinions from the interviewee, this therefore helped me elaborate on my responses from my questionnaire in a more in-depth way. 

Another example of using primary research could be that I provided my target audience with a list of potential names for my documentary, 3 already belonging to existing documentaries, and 1 being my own. One of the important factors that will determine whether or not people will want to view your documentary will be based on its name, therefore I asked respondents to vote which name they prefer. Luckily, the respondents preferred the name of my choice.

Another method of primary research I conducted was undertaking my own controlled observation on the same category of people I am researching about in my documentary. I listed 4 different activities within Banstead on table, and as I approached different respondents providing them with leaflets containing information about each activity I tallied up the interests and their general types of responses towards the activity. Here is a copy of the results I obtained after the observation. 

Generated from my results, most of the activities in Banstead appeal to families with younger children rather than teenagers, such as the Banstead Woods Nature Trail. Another issue I discovered was that Café Italia can be appealing to teenagers, however only to teenagers who have enough disposable income. This may be a restriction to most teenagers in Banstead as it is considered difficult to find jobs within the local area, which may be another reason as to why there could be an increase in criminal activity. After discovering about the lack of job opportunities for teenagers, I could have researched more into people’s opinions of jobs for teenagers within Banstead, which could be behind the reason why some teenagers may not prefer to go to pubs/bars or restaurants. 

A form of secondary research I conducted was researching into different directors of short films by looking at the amount of views, subscribers and likes they get on their YouTube and Facebook pages. From what I discovered, the more social media pages there are the more popular the director/short films are. 

I conducted audience research in order to research into the possible living situations of my target audience therefore I studied the different situations of adults and some teenagers. I started with socio-economic, where I studied how the economic activity affects their social courses. I researched into how much the average employment wage is for a household in Banstead to which I discovered is higher than most parts of the nation, overall it is more likely that my target audience can afford premium channels which does not restrict my target audience from viewing my documentary. After discovering the average employment wage, I realised the likeliness of my target audience viewing my documentary will increase if it was shown on channels at around evening time when everyone in the household will be back from work and school.  

Considering that my target audience are mainly parents and potentially some teenagers, I researched into the most popular products that are used by these age groups. Apple’s products are shown to have a large target audience to every age category.

Audience Research

Audience Research consists of:

Audience classification (socio-economic, geodemographic, psychographic, ethnographic, age, gender, sexual orientation, occupation, education); media preferences; product preferences; buying patterns.

Socio Economics

This studies how economic activity affects and is shaped by social courses. It analyses how societies progress, stagnate, or regress because of their local or regional economy, or the global economy.

My target audience is mainly the parents, and possibly some teenagers. Due to statistics, the average employment wage for a household in Reigate and Banstead is higher than most parts of the nation itself, which suggests that if my documentary were to be shown in cinemas or premium channels the adults of the households are more likely to be able to afford and view it. Therefore, the economic activity does not negatively affect households as their income is at a standard level.

There may be possible factors that can impact how many people view my documentary, such as the timing of when my documentary is shown and on which channel. If my documentary was to be shown during the day, due to statistics the majority of the residents are employed, people are more likely to be out the house. Ideally my documentary should be shown at a reasonable hour on a fairly popular channel in the evening when residents are more likely to watch television. I could also have my documentary be shown in cinemas as based on the average amount of income residents receive, they are more likely to often visit the cinemas which expands on the number of viewings my documentary receives. I believe that adults have more of an advantage than teenagers when it comes to job opportunities in Banstead as there are not many jobs going for young adults, whereas start-up businesses and companies are likely to be successful and generate more income for adults.

Geodemographic

Geodemographic research is a combination of demographics (age, income, sexuality), psychographics (personalities, lifestyles) and the geographical locations of your target audience. It is ideal to find out the personal interests and desires of your target audience especially based on their location.

Geodemographic research has been applied to my documentary as I aimed to find out the personal interests of those living in Banstead. My primary audience for my documentary are the parents that live in Banstead as they could be interested in the reasons as to why people of their children’s age group may or may not want to socialise in Banstead or even discover how little opportunities there are for teenagers to socialise. Parents may also want to see what the younger age groups resort to, such as an increase in drug use or alcohol consumption. Adults who view my documentary may also be interested in how Banstead has changed and what it really has to offer and the personal opinions of others who live there, whether they have recently moved to Banstead or have grown up there. 

Psychographic

Psychographics measures the personal interests, opinions, attitudes and lifestyles of your target audience.

My target audience may be interested in the personal opinions of people their children’s age and what activities they generally get up to, considering that not many parents may not have a general knowledge of what their children get up to, viewing this documentary will enable them to discover what activities their children’s age group do during their spare time and what they could possibly do, such as alcohol consumption, sports or drug use. 

Ethnographic

This describes the culture of your target audience, the aim of this is to understand different perspectives of people from different cultures.

I have taken ethnographic research into consideration as, depending on their culture, my primary audience may not or agree with how Banstead is being portrayed. As my primary audience are the parents, they may not be open or agree to watching how teenagers of a younger generation socialise as it may entirely differ to their generation. Parents who have grown up in Banstead may also be interested in how the place they grew up in is being conveyed, whether it is accurate or not. However, parents may not agree with the statement that there is a lack of social activities in Banstead of teenagers, for example, older generations were able to go into pubs and bars at a younger age and socialise outside in green spaces, whereas now restaurants and bars are stricter on age, therefore they may not be interested in watching it and still be convinced that there are plenty of activities for teenagers to do. 

Age, Gender, Sexual Orientation, Occupation, Education

My primary audience will be parents of teenagers that live-in Banstead, this is because parents may be interested in how people their children’s age feel about the activities in Banstead, whereas my secondary audience will be teenagers that ages range from 13-18 of both genders. 

Media and Product Preferences

My primary and secondary audience mainly consume Apple’s products as they are targeted towards all ages. Adults can be targeted considering that the iPhone is effective for business as well as having resources for daily activities such as maps, internet connections, phone calls, text messaging and cameras. Teenagers can also be targeted as iPhones can be useful for school and college, such as note taking and organisation, as well as for free time such as text messaging. iPods can also be aimed towards teenagers as they can be used for music and social media access.

Buying Patterns

After looking at the percentage of internet users who watch Netflix, 65% of users are aged to 16-24 years (my target audience). In addition to this they will receive recommendations from Netflix on other shows that are a similar genre to what they currently watch, therefore if my target audience do choose to watch real life documentaries then it will be more likely that my documentary on teenagers living in Banstead will come up as a recommendation. 

References:

file:///C:/Users/Yasmin/Downloads/Quality_of_Life_in_Reigate_and_Banstead%20(4).pdf

http://www.statista.com/statistics/421839/netflix-internet-user-age-usa/