Research
on "Major Factors that Affect Decision Making of Teenagers
in
Bangkok to Watch Horror Movies"
By
Pitak Panprem
Abstract
This thesis aims at investigating whether demographic
factor, film elements, external factors and social unit are major aspects that
direct teenagers in Bangkok to watch horror movies. The study is a survey
research of a sample of 400 teenagers, age between 15 to 21, living in Bangkok.
The sample is required to complete the questionnaires (self-administered), and
the data are statistically summarized to find out its Frequency Distribution,
Percentage, Mean Value, Chi-square, Correlation Coefficient Analysis, and
Multiple Regression Analysis.
It is expected from the population samples, who are
mostly male, age 19, locally living in Bangkok, studying for bachelor degree
and whose family income is between 10,000-20,000 baht/month, that the major
factors that determine them to watch a horror movie are its quality of content
and its verisimilitude (quality of being true or real). By contrast, the aspect
that affects the viewers the least is obscene or pornographic scenes
The external factors that are defined in this research
are advertisement and/or marketing strategy.
It is expected that the majority of the sample agrees that television is
the most effective media for advertising; it is a deciding factor for teenagers
to watch horror movies. The less significant aspect is trailer, and the least
important element is radio spot.
Other marketing strategies that should compel young
viewers to watch horror films are, firstly, location of the movie theatre, the
price of movie ticket, and promotion, respectively.
The social unit such as family and friends is also
supposed to be taken into consideration by teenagers. They are likely to watch
horror movies when they go out with a group of friends (about 3-4 people).
These assumptions are tested and result as follow,
-Demography: it is found
out that age, gender, education, and place of birth of the young samples living
in Bangkok relate to their decision to choose horror movie viewing. Yet, their
income has no relation to such decision.
-Film elements: actors in
leading role play important part in affecting the teenagers’ decision, whereas
other factors such as the name of the director, the movie’s content, cinematic
technique, scene and setting, level of dreadfulness and terror, obscenity,
realistic aspect, the name of the movie, and sound and music have no relation
to teenagers’ decision in choosing to watch horror movies.
-Marketing strategies: the
study reveals that viewers’ feedback, seating comfort, TV advertisement,
internet, billboard, posters, bus advertisement, pre-show activities, movie
discounting coupon, and souvenir distribution are relevant factors. On the
other hand, the price of movie ticket, the movie theatre’s location, theatrical
trailer, radio spot and newspaper advertisement are irrelevant to the target
group’s decision.
- Social unit which consists of
family and friends has no influence to the expected outcome.
The
purposes of this research
1. to study the relationship between
demographic characteristics and the decision making of Bangkok teenagers to
watching horror movies ;
2. to study the factors on the
composition of the film that affects the decision making of Bangkok teenagers
to watching horror movies ;
3. to study the factors on external
surrounding that affect the decision making of Bangkok teenagers to watching
the horror movies ;
4. to study the social factors that
affect the decision making of Bangkok teenagers to watching the horror movies.
Methods
This research is the Survey Research in the form of ‘One
- Shot Case Study’ based on a random in the form of ‘Multi-Stage Random
Sampling’ through the Purposive Random Sampling and Accidental Random Sampling
to acquire the sample group and data respectively that meet the researcher’s
quality requirement. The sample group
under the study is approximately 400 teenagers ageing between 15 to 21 years
who live in Bangkok.
The tools used to collect data are questionnaires -
‘Self - Administered Questionnaire’ which consists of ‘Close-ended
Questionnaire’ and ‘Open - Ended Questionnaire’ to be filled out.
The researcher uses statistical analysis in two parts
for data analysis. The first part is
the use of descriptive statistics to find out Frequency, Percentage, Mean Value
presented in a table format together with descriptive translation to provide
explanation on demographic characteristics, economic and social status,
elements of horror films, external surroundings and social groups. The second part is the use of statistical
hypothesis testing, that is, the statistical analysis to find out Chi-Square,
Correlation Coefficient Analysis and Multiple Regression Analysis.
Results
Demographic
characteristics
The results of the research showed that the majority of
the samples were male and most are between 20 to 21 years, studying in higher education (bachelor degree) than
vocational education(vocational certificate, high vocational certificate), and
senior high school . As for their
economic status or family income, it was found that most of their income is
between 10,000 to 20,000 baht per month, and has a domicile in Bangkok rather
than provinces.
Element
Factors in horror movies
The elements of horror films for study in this research
are contents of the film, violent scenes, obscene scenes, filming techniques,
locations, verisimilitude, title, story, sound-track, actors/actresses, and
directors.
The results showed that the elements in horror films
influence the decision making to watch a horror movie among the samples to the
maximum level. The elements that
influence the decision making the most are the content of the film followed by
verisimilitude and filming techniques.
The elements that affect the decision making of the samples the least
are obscene scenes and sexual implied scenes.
In the context of the content of horror films, it is
found that the contents about ghost or devil are the most appreciated and
wanted to watch followed by contents about a psycho killer, the character is in
danger locked in a confined space and with no way out, natural beast and
creatures from outer space.
Speaking about the characteristic of the story of the
horror film, the samples pay attention to the unprecedented, non-monotonous
modern story as well as famous and popular compositions in this order.
The characteristic of actors/actresses starred in the
horror film rather than their appearance, fame or previously winning any awards
have been given the most attention by the samples.
Likewise, the characteristic of the director has an
effect on the decisions to view a
horror movie. The samples give
attention to their favorite director whose works they follow regularly rather
than the director’s fame, popularity or ever winning any awards before.
The elements of the filming techniques, that is, the
Special Effect is being given the highest attention followed by make-up to make
realism, (Make Up Effect) and sound techniques (Sound Effect).
As for the sound technique, the samples prefer to listen
to the natural sound focusing on the atmosphere or events going on in the films
rather than dreadful horrible screaming of ghosts, devils or the growl of the
beast. Likewise, they also want to
listen to the music that fits the ongoing events in the film.
It is interesting that the results of the research
showed the scenes which the samples want to view most are not the brutal,
disgusting scenes but ones that focus on frightening and horrified atmosphere.
External
factors
The external surrounding factors relating to this study
are a media exposure and the movie business marketing strategies.
With regard to the media exposure, the samples view that
the sources of media that highly affects their decision to watching horror
movies most are television followed by
trailer and cinema while the least influence is through radio spot.
Study into the details of the reception of information
relating to the horror films through all kinds of media, it is found that
newspapers that receive the most acceptance by the samples are Thai Rath, Daily News, and Khao
Sod respectively and Matichon gets the least acceptance. As for the media magazines related to the
movie, the most attractive among the samples is Movie Times followed by
Entertainment and Star Pics. The
television media that is most accepted among the samples is Channel 7 followed
by UBC and Channel 3 and the least accepted is Channel 11.
In acquiring information relating to comments on Horror
Films by all kinds of media, newspapers that have obtained the samples’ highest
attention are Thai Rath, Daily News and Komchadluek and Matichon gets the least
acceptance. The movie magazines that
provide the samples with maximum information are the Entertainment followed by
Movie Time, Star Pics in this order. And
the television stations that provide the samples with the maximum criticism
about horror movies are UBC, cable TV followed by Channel 7, and Channel 9 and
Channel 11 provides the minimum criticism.
The majority of the samples watch the horror films at
cinema less than once a month , followed by once a month and 2-3 times a month
respectively. The majority group also
watches some horror films followed by almost all films.
In connection to film viewing behavior, it is found that
the majority of samples would go to the cinema for horror movies viewing at
whatever day and time depend on occasion and convenience followed by Saturday -
Sunday and weekdays evening and afternoon respectively. Likewise, the samples prefer to go to any
cinemas which are close to department store, home and school in this order depend
on occasion and convenience. It is also
found that the nature of nearly half of these samples chooses to watch the
films with friends and watching with
family would be the final choice.
Marketing strategies of the film business pose high
influence on overall samples decision making to watch the horror movies. The location followed by ticket price and
market promotion is the factors that affect the decision making.
Premises factors that affect the samples decision making
most are seating comfort followed by the location of the movie theater.
Factors on market promotion that affect the decision
making most are trailers followed by television advertisements, posters or
billboard, discount coupons, Internet advertising, souvenirs and giveaways distribution. The bus
side advertising received least attention.
Considering all the sub-factors, it is found that
seating comfort is the factor that affects the decision making to watching the
film of the samples most (mean 4.08 ), followed by the trailer shown in
theaters (average 3.98) and location of the cinema (average. 3.82).
Social
factors
Social factors have high influence on the decision
making to watching horror films of the sample group (average 3.58). The sample group chooses to watch horror
movies with a group of friends most (average 22.4) and to watch horror movies
with up to 3-4 friends at a time (average 4.22)
Conclusion
This thesis aims at investigating whether demographic
factor, film elements, external factors and social unit are major aspects that
direct teenagers in Bangkok to watch horror movies. The study is a survey
research of a sample of 400 teenagers, age between 15 to 21, living in Bangkok.
The sample is required to complete the questionnaires (self-administered), and
the data are statistically summarized to find out its Frequency Distribution,
Percentage, Mean Value, Chi-square, Correlation Coefficient Analysis, and
Multiple Regression Analysis.
It is expected from the population samples, who are
mostly male, age 19, locally living in Bangkok, studying for bachelor degree
and whose family income is between 10,000-20,000 baht/month, that the major
factors that determine them to watch a horror movie are its quality of content
and its verisimilitude (quality of being true or real). By contrast, the aspect
that affects the viewers the least is obscene or pornographic scenes
The external factors that are defined in this research
are advertisement and/or marketing strategy.
It is expected that the majority of the sample agrees that television is
the most effective media for advertising; it is a deciding factor for teenagers
to watch horror movies. The less significant aspect is trailer, and the least
important element is radio spot.
Other marketing strategies that should compel young viewers
to watch horror films are, firstly, location of the movie theatre, the price of
movie ticket, and promotion, respectively.
The social unit such as family and friends is also
supposed to be taken into consideration by teenagers. They are likely to watch
horror movies when they go out with a group of friends (about 3-4 people).
These assumptions are tested and result as follow,
-Demography: it is found out
that age, gender, education, and place of birth of the young samples living in
Bangkok relate to their decision to choose horror movie viewing. Yet, their
income has no relation to such decision.
-Film elements: actors in
leading role play important part in affecting the teenagers’ decision, whereas
other factors such as the name of the director, the movie’s content, cinematic
technique, scene and setting, level of dreadfulness and terror, obscenity,
realistic aspect, the name of the movie, and sound and music have no relation
to teenagers’ decision in choosing to watch horror movies.
-Marketing strategies: the study reveals that viewers’ feedback,
seating comfort, TV advertisement, internet, billboard, posters, bus
advertisement, pre-show activities, movie discounting coupon, and souvenir
distribution are relevant factors. On the other hand, the price of movie
ticket, the movie theatre’s location, theatrical trailer, radio spot and
newspaper advertisement are irrelevant to the target group’s decision.
- Social unit which consists of
family and friends has no influence to the expected outcome.
The hierarchical pattern of
factors that affect decision making of teenagers in Bangkok to watch horror
movies is that:
1. Demographic factor
2. External factors, such as
advertisement and/or marketing strategies, which also need to correlate with
the young viewers’ reception
3. Film elements, which contains the
minor factor of leading actors
It
is noted that social unit is irrelevant factor to teenager’s decision making in
watching horror movies.
Bibliography
Becker,
Boris W. and others, “The Influence of Personal Values on Movie Preferences,”
Current Research in Film : Audiences, Economics, and Law, 1985.
Bruce
A. Austin, A look at movie audiences: immediate seating (USA: Wadsworth, Inc.,
1989)
Hutchings,
Peter. “Modern horror and the 1970s” The Horror Film, 2004.
Joseph
T. Klapper. The Effect of Mass Communication. New York : Free press, 1967,
Mitchell
, Alice Miller , op . cit ., footnote 64,
Mitchell,
Alice Miller. Children and Movies (Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 1929)
Otis,
Laura. “Selective Exposure to the Film Close Encounters,” Journal of Psychology
101 (197) : 293-295.
Richard
M. Gollin, A Viewer’s Guide to Film (USA: McGraw-Hill Inc., 1992),
This reserch interests me a lot. Some Factors that impacts teenagers of making decision to watch horror movies make me surprised. It could be useful to continue doing a reserch in this way.
ReplyDelete:))