Hi Sam,I don't have good overall statistics on the number of viewers of science and comedy shows - perhaps check with the Nielsen ratings and/or whatever the UK equivalent would be - but I did do a survey asking people about what science shows they watch for my thesis project. The survey participants were mostly students and faculty in North Dakota, USA, and mostly scientists, so I don't know how helpful this would be for you. The Big Bang Theory was the only comedy listed in my survey, (well, MythBusters also has some elements of comedy,) and it was among the top three most popular science shows for both the scientist and non-scientist survey participants. (Of course, the fact that it's a prime-time network show could also explain its popularity.)http://katrina-jackson.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Thesis-Final-Jackson.pdf See pages 66-68. (The methodology is explained pages 40-48.)
Good luck!Thanks,KatrinaKatrina JacksonOn Wed, Nov 13, 2013 at 11:56 AM, Sam Gregson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:Dear all-
I do a lot of science stand up comedy and need to write a report/speech justifying why it is an important and desirable method of disseminating scientific information.
I'm looking for a good source of statistics RE the popularity/viewing figures of comedy (e.g. Mock the Week), science (e.g. Horizon) and science comedy (e.g. QI, Dara's sci club etc) TV/radio shows. Any stats showing the popularity of science comedy shows relative to straight science shows would be even better! Any stats showing an increase in science comedy viewers or the proliferation of science comedy shows would also be great.
I thought someone on this list might have looked into this before and have some insights. I bow to your greater wisdom before I start ham-fistedly Googling ;)
Thanks!
Sam :)
**********************************************************************
Commands - send an email (any subject) to [log in to unmask] with one of the following messages (ignoring text in brackets)
set psci-com nomail (to stop receiving messages while on holiday)
set psci-com mail (to resume getting messages)
signoff psci-com (to leave the list)
Subscribe here https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A0=psci-com
Contact list owner at [log in to unmask]uk
Small print and JISCMail acceptable use policy https://sites.google.com/site/pscicomjiscmail/the-small-print
**********************************************************************
**********************************************************************Commands - send an email (any subject) to [log in to unmask] with one of the following messages (ignoring text in brackets)
set psci-com nomail (to stop receiving messages while on holiday) set psci-com mail (to resume getting messages) signoff psci-com (to leave the list) Subscribe here https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A0=psci-com
Contact list owner at [log in to unmask] Small print and JISCMail acceptable use policy https://sites.google.com/site/pscicomjiscmail/the-small-print
**********************************************************************
Commands - send an email (any subject) to [log in to unmask] with one of the following messages (ignoring text in brackets)
set psci-com nomail (to stop receiving messages while on holiday) set psci-com mail (to resume getting messages) signoff psci-com (to leave the list) Subscribe here https://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/cgi-bin/webadmin?A0=psci-com
Contact list owner at [log in to unmask] Small print and JISCMail acceptable use policy https://sites.google.com/site/pscicomjiscmail/the-small-print
**********************************************************************