research progress

Phase One of our fieldwork (recruiting diarists, diary-writing, and subsequent interviews with diarists and focus groups) started in February 2004 and was completed at the beginning of March 2005.

Our aim was to recruit approximately 30 diarists, but we knew that substantial allowance would need to be made for drop-out, given the demanding nature of the project; we initially recruited 38, with 5 dropping out for various personal reasons of whom 4 were replaced, resulting in 37 diarists overall from 6 regions (chosen to give a variety of urban, suburban and rural locations, with a range of incomes).

Of those all but 1 contributed a substantial diary, with 27 substantially completing the 3 months diary period. We then reinterviewed 30 of our diarists, at the end of 2004 and beginning of 2005, and conducted focus groups in four of our six regions.

Phase Two of the project, a survey of 1000 people across Great Britain, was conducted in June 2005. Analysis of both qualitative and quantitative data continued until early 2006, and a final enduser seminar was held at the LSE on 20 March 2006, in which we presented our key findings and released Media Consumption and the Future of Public Connection report (available at the home page).