Country by country, peak viewing times vary somewhat:

• South Korea has the latest viewing peak, with the highest proportion of viewers (26%) tuning in between 10pm and 11pm
• New Zealand and Australia have the highest proportion of viewers tuning in at any particular time – on average, 40 percent of New Zealanders and Australians watch television between the hours of 8pm and 9pm, closely followed by the Philippines with 39 percent
• New Zealand has the highest number of viewers outside of the 8pm to 9pm peak time – between 7pm and 8pm 39 percent of New Zealanders tune in to their televisions and the 6pm to 7pm time slot also enjoys around 35 percent of New Zealand viewers
• Malaysia has the largest proportion of late night viewers, with one quarter of Malaysians still watching television between the hours of 11pm and midnight
• Filipinos are the most likely to tune in to daytime television – more than one in five (22%) watch television between 12pm and 2pm.

Scripted Shows for Teens, Realities for Older Females
Teen and Millennial viewers in particular dedicated over a third of their primetime scripted TV viewing to series depicting at least one regular or recurring LGBT character.* Females 50 and older were attracted to realities featuring LGBT cast-members, hosts, judges and/or competitors, dedicating a significant share of their reality TV time to these programs.* Overall, one in four scripted series and one in five reality shows were LGBT-inclusive.

“The inclusion of LGBT characters on TV more accurately portrays the diverse and multicultural society we live in by encompassing all segments of the population,” said Matt O’Grady, EVP, Audience Measurement, Nielsen.

LGBT-Inclusive Shows Attract Dynamic Audiences
Audiences for LGBT-inclusive shows were as diverse as the programs themselves, though certain demographics appear to have been more exposed to LGBT images. Within the 25-49 age demographic, LGBT-inclusive programs (and its advertisers) were most likely to reach:

• College-educated white females
• Small white collar households
• Budding families (those with 3 or fewer members)

Non-white, professional Millennials without children also tended to watch LGBT-inclusive shows more frequently than primetime in general.

LGBT-Inclusive characters were incorporated into shows that skewed towards Eastern and Pacific viewers and were less watched by Midwesterners. This differential was most pronounced among 18-24 year olds in the Midwest, especially when compared to 18-24 year olds in other regions of the U.S.

Motion Pictures and Department Stores Drive Advertising
LGBT characters and plots were woven into some of the most popular broadcast primetime programs last season, and advertisers were investing their budgets there too. Motion pictures and department stores were the top categories that drove advertising on LGBT-inclusive programming, devoting 28.3 percent and 27.6 percent of their ad dollars, respectively.

Credit cards, telephone, and tech companies also spent a significant share of ad dollars with LGBT-friendly programs. Of the top 10 overall advertising categories, retail and pharmaceuticals dedicated less of their ad budgets to these shows than they did on the average for all categories.

*This list was determined by GLAAD in conjunction with their Where We Are On TV Report: 2010-2011 Season, and includes scripted programs such as Modern Family, Grey’s Anatomy, The Office, 90210, Glee and House, as well as reality shows such as Dancing with the Stars and Big Brother 12. GLAAD’s Where We Are on TV Report: 2011-2012 is now available at www.glaad.org.

Reality Rises
Reality first made an appearance in the top 10 rankings in 2000, and since the 2002-2003 season has consistently captured the largest percentage of the audience watching the top 10 broadcast programs.  In the 2007-2008 season, reality programming captured 77 percent of the total audience viewing those top 10 programs.

Sports Scores
The audience for Sports Events in the top 10 programs has hovered around 8 percent since the 2001 season, until it jumped to 19.4 percent in the 2009-2010 season and held tight last year.

Dramas Deliver
The audience for General Dramas peaked in the 2005-2006 season, accounting for 42.8 percent of the total audience,  but decreased by about half last year, consisting of 21.6 percent of the total audience. Still, they have remained a consistent presence in the top 10.

Sitcoms Sit Out
Sitcoms, on the other hand, have had a tougher time holding a spot in the top 10. Once synonymous with primetime broadcasts, sitcoms disappeared from the ranking in the 2004-2005 season, only to return again briefly in the 2008-2009 season, making up just 7.4 percent of the total combined audience of the top ten programs.

Looking Ahead to this TV Season
Monday’s official kickoff of the Fall TV season creates opportunity for new TV hits and misses.  Will sitcoms reclaim their position in the top ten ranking or will reality programs extend their reign? Or, will a new program type emerge and shake up the rankings yet again?  Stay tuned.

Methodology
Nielsen analyzed the broadcast prime ranking reports for the September to September seasons over the past decade (September-STD for the 2010-2011 season) to determine the top genres of TV programs (type codes).

For each season, we selected the top ten broadcast primetime programs (ranked on HH rating) and added the average audience of each program together, to get one figure for the total combined audience of the top ten programs.  Then, we added up the average audiences for each type code in the top ten list and calculated the percentage of the total audience for each type code.  For example, in the 2001-2002 season, “General Drama” programming held 29.5% of the total audience for the top ten broadcast primetime programs.

Although there are no differences between when men and women watch TV during primetime, age is a factor. Viewers ages 18-49 typically tune in later. For this demographic, 9:45 to 10:00pm is prime viewing time, while they use TV the least at the beginning of primetime, from 8:00 to 8:15pm.

Broadcast television placements grew by almost 12% between January and June of 2008, while placements on cable television declined by 20%.

Changes in program line-ups accounted for the growth of broadcast placements — and the decrease in cable placements. 

On the broadcast side, two programs with a significant number of product placements aired more episodes in early 2008, boosting the overall number of placements in the first half of the year.  NBC’s “Biggest Loser,” which normally airs in the fall, moved the start of its fifth season up to January 2008, while FOX’s “Hell’s Kitchen” started its fifth season in April, several months earlier than it did in 2007. 

On the cable side, shows like TLC’s “American Chopper” and “Miami Ink,” MTV’s “Run’s House” and “Pimp My Ride,” and A&E’s “Driving Force” and “Dog The Bounty Hunter,” which featured a large number of product placements in early 2007, aired less frequently or were removed from cable primetime line-ups during the first half of 2008. 

Overall, 204,919 product placements aired on broadcast and cable TV programs between January and June of 2008. 

Nielsen’s report includes data for 11 networks, including ABC, CBS, CW, FOX, MNT, NBC, A&E, Bravo, HGTV, MTV, and TLC.

View the full press release.

Read more about product placement trends in Nielsen’s “Consumer Insight” newsletter.

Read coverage of Nielsen’s findings in Condé Nast Portfolio, Ad Age, Variety, The New York Times, Multichannel News, Broadcasting & Cable, The Globe and Mail, and MediaPost.