Nielsen Media Research surveys television viewers to determine the numbers of people watching particular shows. At the time of this writing, there are an estimated 115.9 million U.S. households with televisions. Each rating point represents 1% of that number, or 1,159,000 households. Therefore, for instance, if 60 Minutes received a rating of 5.8, then 5.8% of all U.S. households with televisions, or (0.058)(115,900,000)=6,722,200 households, were tuned to that program. A rating point does not mean that 1,159,000 people are watching a program. A rating point refers to the number of households with television sets tuned to that program; there may be more than one person watching a television set in the household. Nielsen Media Research also describes a program’s share of the market. Share is the percent of households with television sets in use that are tuned to a program. Suppose that the same week that 60 Minutes received 5.8 rating points, the show received a share of 11%. This would mean that 11% of all households with a television turned on were tuned to 60 Minutes, whereas 5.8% of all households with a television were tuned to the program.
a. If CSI received a Nielsen rating of 10.1 and a share of 17, how many TV households watched the program that week? How many TV households were watching television during that hour? Round to the nearest hundred thousand.
b. Suppose that Glee received a rating of 5.6 and a share of 11. How many TV households watched the program that week? How many TV households were watching television during that hour? Round to the nearest hundred thousand.
c. Suppose that Modern Family received a rating of 7.5 during a week in which 19,781,000 people were watching the show. Find the average number of people per TV household who watched the program. Round to the nearest tenth. Nielsen Media Research has a website on the Internet. You can locate the site by using a search engine. The site does not list rating points or market share, but these statistics can be found on other websites by using a search engine.
d. Find the top two prime-time broadcast television shows for last week. Calculate the numbers of TV households that watched these programs. Compare the figures with the top two cable TV programs for last week.