1. 1 Media Audience Research in Croatia Industry and Academia Synergies with Policy Implications April 7, 2011 Faculty of Political Science University of Zagreb Organizer: Zrinjka Perusko In cooperation with the COST Program Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies Introduction: Kim Christian Schrøder

2. COST European Cooperation in Science and Technology Action IS0906 Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies www.cost.eu www.cost-transforming-audiences.eu

3. 3 COST is... funded by FP7 a framework allowing the coordination of nationally funded research on a European level, through the support of cooperation and mobility of researchers COST supports:Action grant: - Travels and subsistence - Meetings and conferences - Training schools - Short-term scientific missions (STSM) - Publication and dissemination - Administration of the Action - Actions (concerted research networks) - Exploratory/strategic workshops - Conference grant for early-stage researchers

4. 4 COST domains BMBS - Biomedicine and Molecular Biosciences CMST - Chemistry and Molecular Sciences and technologies ESSEM - Earth System Science and Environmental Management FA - Food and Agriculture FPS - Forests, their Products and Services ICT - Information and Communication Technologies ISCH - Individuals, Societies, Cultures and Health MPNS - Materials, Physical and Nanosciences TUD - Transport and Urban Development + Trans-Domain Proposals IS0906 Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies COST 298 Participation in the broadband society IS0801 Cyberbullying: Coping with negative and enhancing positive uses of new technologies, in relationships in educational settings

5. 5 Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies Initiative of the Audience and Reception Studies section of ECREA (European Communication Research and Education Association) Main objective: to coordinate research efforts into the key transformations of European audiences within a changing media and communication environment, identifying their complex interrelationships with the social, cultural and political areas of European societies. Period of activity: 01/03/2010 - 28/02/2014 185 individual members, 30 participating countries across Europe

6. 6 1. Mapping existing research initiatives 2. Defining a research agenda 3. Scoping audience and society transformations 4. Revitalising audience research 5. Developing recommendations Scientific work plan

7. 7 Management structure Management committee: decides about work plan and budget plan Steering group: carries out the day-to-day managerial work Coordinators: take care of the newsletter,the website, the essays, and the short-term scientific missions Working groups: carry out the actual scientific work Grant Holder: provides the financial, administrative and organisational support WG1 New media genres, media literacy and trust in the media WG2 Audience interactivity and participation WG3 The role of media and ICT for evolving social relationships WG4 Audience transformations and social integration

8. 8 Opportunities Overviewing the research field in Europe Inspiring new research questions and opening up new areas of inquiry Fostering the integration of the field and developing a culture of cooperation across Europe: Bringing together different (research) cultures Supporting emerging scholars and research centres Building bridges between the academic and non-academic worlds: Liaising with non-academic stakeholders Stimulating national initiatives

9. 9 Liaison – ambitious beginnings 1.This morning: Media Audience Research in Croatia: Industry and Academia Synergies with Policy Implications 2.This afternoon: 1.Roundtable with non-academic groups: ”Media literacy: ambitions, policies and measures” 2.Roundtable with non-academic groups: ”Audience research: academic and non-academic approaches and cooperation possibilities

10. 10 My take: Bridging the divide: Shared interest Shared interest: Mapping and understanding audiences ”Target groups”: predicting and controlling audience behaviour (industry perspective) ”Everyday lifeworlds”: understanding cultural sense-making processes, complexifying audiences (academic perspective) Common ground: –Developing new methodological tools for mapping audience territories –Acknowledging the need for a complexifying lens in order to understand an increasingly hyper-complex, mediatized society –User-orientation does not mean giving people what they say they want! –Instead: understand their lifeworld and meet their desire for worthwhile experiences, in media and elsewhere

11. 11 Shared interest: understanding crossmedia navigation Audiences are inherently cross-media! “A genuine audience perspective on the contemporary media culture must adopt a cross- media lens, because people in everyday life, as individuals and groups, form their identities and found their practices through being the inevitable sense-making hubs of the spokes of the mediatized culture” (Schrøder 2011)

12. 12 Cross-media audience research: keywords constellations of media matrix of media media choice mediascape media repertoires transmedial patterns of use mediatized (life)worlds consumer portfolios

13. 13 ”Perceived worthwhileness”: a conceptual lens The media user is a shopper in the supermarket of media (news) Worthwhileness - A radical user perspective: –A common-sensical ’scaffolding’ concept for designing empirical audience/user research: ”Is this news medium worth my while?” –A ’inside’ audience perspective on news media, not an ’outside’ Sender’s perspective –Departure in the individual, social news consumer. –Citizen-consumers browse the entire news universe: rationality and ritual

14. 14 Dimensions of worthwhileness Interrelated factors in a personal calculation: –Temporality: availability of time –Spatiality: situational affordances –Materiality: technological affordances –Affordance of 'public connection’ (sense of belonging to social and cultural networks) –Price –Normative constraints –Participatory affordance Worthwhileness by default

15. 15 How to develop academia/industry synergies? Some examples from Denmark Build forums of dialogue –”Network for qualitative method innovation”: Bi-monthly sharing of project experiences of reflective individual audience researchers Plan collaborative research: mapping audiences –Joint research projects, modest level of ambition (ex. developing a typology of news users): 1 university scholar and newspaper publishing house Plan collaborative research and development –Joint research-based design of exhibitions in/with museums and science centres. Developing and evaluating prototypes, drawing on theories about digital literacy, creativity and learning. Large research team, large-scale public funding. Your locally relevant ideas for spotting synergies!

16. Thank you!