Media consumption by working professionals during lockdown up 25%: Study

Media consumption by working professionals during the two months of complete lockdown has seen a rise of 25 per cent for an average of four hours daily, states a study by MICA's Centre for Media and Entertainment Studies (CMES).

Titled 'Covid-19 and Content Consumption', the study also shows that 8.3 per cent of respondents consumed more than eight hours of content daily, even as over 75 per cent respondents preferred comedy as a genre during the lockdown.

Covering nearly 430 respondents across more than 60 cities, the study tapped 50 per cent working professionals, 46.6 per cent students, and rest including homemakers. Conducted by a team led by MICA faculty member Santosh Patra, head, CMES, with Leslin Bastian and three students from the second year of PGP including Piyush Goswami, Mohammad Salman Khan and Aakriti Ananya, the study covered the period of April-May 2020 that marked complete lockdown.

According to the study, there was a clear shift and increase in content consumption patterns since the onset of the lockdown. 

"Before the lockdown, nearly 57 per cent of the people watched less than two hours of content, 32.7 per cent consumed 2-4 hours of content and 7.5 per cent consumed 4-6 hours of content on a daily basis. However, during the lockdown, there was an increase of 25 per cent - from 7.5 per cent to 31.5 per cent - in people who consumed four hours of content daily. A substantial increase in people consuming more than eight hours of content was also reported. From 2.3 per cent during pre-lockdown, this rose to 8.3 per cent during the lockdown," the study states.

Speaking about the study, Patra elaborated, "Media has witnessed major shifts in content consumption habits among people. As life outdoors came to a standstill, there was panic, anxiety, and fear among people which made them look for alternate ways of escapism. This resulted in a sudden bout of classical revivalism with Doordarshan airing Ramayana and Mahabharata tele-serials to Amul telecasting advertisements of the 90s. Hence, it is imperative for us to understand the reason behind the shift and interpret the changes."
 

According to Patra, as far as an immediate change in habits was concerned, the study observed that TikTok seemed to have broken the age barrier as working professionals preferred TikTok more than students. "This was possibly due to the work from home environment," Patra added.

The study states that ‘Money Heist’ on Netflix and ‘Panchayat’ on Amazon Prime were the most-watched shows during the lockdown. In terms of OTT platforms, Netflix emerged as the go-to OTT platform among students while professionals preferred Disney+Hotstar. Among Indian OTT players, Voot registered the highest number of new subscribers during the lockdown.

Further, after e-learning, social games were the most popular new form of content consumed by students, the study reveals. According to Patra, the lockdown resulted in a surge of social gaming apps, which was seen as a way of filling the void of being unable to go out and hang out with friends. For instance, Ludo King emerged as the leader in gaming apps with 37.5 per cent of people claiming to have played Ludo King at least once during the period of lockdown.

"In terms of news, nearly 57 per cent of the respondents termed social media as the primary source of news, followed by news apps. The newspaper was the least preferred source of news with only 18 per cent of respondents choosing it," the study concluded.