AUDIENCE PERCEPTION OF BIG BROTHER AFRICA TELEVISION REALITY SHOW

A RESEARCH SUBMITTED BY:

ODESOLA, TITILOPE RACHEL

MATRIC NO: RUN0607/814

To the Department of

MASS COMMUNICATION

College of Management sciences

Redeemer’s University, Redemption City, Ogun state, Nigeria

In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the award of

B.SC. MASS COMMUNICATION (Programme)

MAY, 2010

ABSTRACT

This research is a study on the Audience Perception of Big Brother Africa Television Reality Show. The purpose of the study was to find out whether the perception of the audience about Big Brother Africa show is positive, negative or neutral. The survey and content analysis methods were utilized in this study. The systematic sampling method was adopted for survey while simple random sampling was adopted for content analysis.

A survey method helped to get the perception of the audience about Big Brother Africa (BBA). A total of 500 questionnaires were administered to the respondents and 452 were properly completed and returned, representing 90.4 per cent response rate. On the other hand, content analysis was used to examine the content of Big Brother Africa, Here, 80 video clips were content analyzed from all the four editions of the show. The content categories examined are: dialogues of the contestants, their costumes and the sex expressions in the clips, in terms of erotic dances, nudity, kissing, fondling and love making.

The findings from this study showed that most of the respondents assented that the costume of the contestants were indecent and the level of nudity in the show was high, It can also be inferred that BBA had more negative content. Most of the content in terms of the sentences uttered by the contestants during the show was vulgar, most of the costumes that the contestants wore were provocative and there were a large number of erotic dances, nudity, kissing and fondling expressions. Further findings show that BBA does not contribute positive values to the Nigerian society as most of the respondents were of the opinion that Big Brother Africa does not depict the African culture and that the show itself should be banned on Nigerian Local Television stations. Therefore, it is recommended that policy makers and regulatory bodies should put more efforts at examining the contents of both local and foreign reality shows that are allowed to go on air in Nigerian stations.