Differences in Viewership of DTH and OTT on the Basis of Gender

Abstract

Gender differences vary from culture to culture due to societal norms. OTT services and DTH services have various parameters, which have been considered to understand the preferences that individuals have, and if these are influenced due to gender. Objectives - This research was conducted to understand the relationship between the gender of the respondents to their preference for entertainment platforms and content availability, content quality, affordability, and customer service of DTH and OTT services. Methods - Primary data for this particular research was collected through a Google Form questionnaire and the sample size included a total of 307 respondents. The research was analytical in nature. The data collected was analyzed using the Pearson Chi Square test to understand the relationship between our chosen variables, used to test the hypotheses. Conclusion - It was found that there was no significant association between the gender of individual participants and their preference for entertainment platforms and content availability, content quality, affordability, and customer service of the entertainment services.

Introduction

I. INTRODUCTION

Over-the-Top services apply to content presented via high - speed internet and not using cable or satellite providers. OTT services have strongly emerged in the Indian media industry, and the OTT market still has a very large potential for growth in the future as the acceptance of OTT services is high in India. Direct-to-Home services are traditional cable or satellite services, transmitted by broadcasting satellites. DTH is a wireless system, which helps provide remote and urban access. These services are delivered to consumers with the help of service / cable providers, who provide consumers with subscriptions to the same.

Consumer preferences can be defined as the subjective preferences of individuals and, OTT and DTH are services that are used in comparison to one another to understand which of the two products are preferred. According to the India Watch Report (2019), more women are starting to consume online media entertainment. They report that in 2019, 45% of women were consuming online media which is more than in 2018. Using this paper, we try to understand if specific parameters in relation with gender are the reason for the shift towards the OTT services in comparison to DTH. Gender are the various characteristics that help differentiate between various social structures of gender identity. Gender can vary from society to society and change over time, according to social constructs (WHO, 2021). Various psychological concepts play a role in the way gender norms are formed, the gender differences which are created due to social learning, are said to be one of the main sources of gender differences (Reich, Sabine, 2019). This paper aims to understand the shift toward OTT services by comparing certain parameters, on the basis of gender. This paper will compare a consumers’ preference to watch either DTH or OTT, using gender with the parameters of content availability and its quality, the affordability of either platform, and the platforms’ customer service. Comparing these parameters, will provide us with an insight as to, if these specific parameters are the reason for the shifting trend towards OTT platforms from DTH services.

II. RESEARCH QUESTIONS

A. Does gender have an impact on people’s preferences for watching entertainment platforms?

B. How would availability and quality of content affect viewership of entertainment platforms on the basis of gender?

C. Does gender impact the viewership of entertainment services based on their affordability?

D. What effect does customer service have on the viewership of entertainment platforms based on people’s gender?

III. OBJECTIVES

This research was undertaken for the following objectives:

1. To understand if gender has an impact on people’s preferences for watching entertainment platforms.
2. To determine the impact of availability and quality of content on the viewership of entertainment platforms based on gender.
3. To find the impact of gender on the viewership of entertainment services based on their affordability.
4. To learn the effect of customer service on the viewership of entertainment platforms based on people’s gender.

IV. HYPOTHESES OF THE STUDY

1. Null Hypothesis (Ho) - There is no significant association between gender and preference for watching entertainment platforms.

Alternate Hypothesis (H1) - There is a significant association between gender preference for watching entertainment platforms.

2. Null Hypothesis (Ho) - There is no significant association between gender and content availability of entertainment platforms.

Alternate Hypothesis (H1) - There is a significant association between gender and content availability of entertainment platforms.

3. Null Hypothesis (Ho) - There is no significant association between gender and the content quality of entertainment platforms.

Alternate Hypothesis (H1) - There is a significant association between gender and the content quality of entertainment platforms.

4. Null Hypothesis (Ho) - There is no significant association between gender and the affordability of entertainment platforms.

Alternate Hypothesis (H1) - There is a significant association between gender and the affordability of entertainment platforms.

5. Null Hypothesis (Ho) - There is no significant association between gender and customer service of entertainment platforms.

Alternate Hypothesis (H1) - There is a significant association between gender and customer service of entertainment platforms.

V. REVIEW OF LITERATURE

Quresh Moochhala’s (2018) primary goal was to explore how the digital revolution of India will impact the entertainment sector, more specifically the impact of OTT platforms on traditional media. Moochhala (2018) found how gender of a consumer impacts what genre a person might watch. According to Moochhala (2018) females prefer romance, comedy, and horror, while males prefer to watch comedy, and action & thriller genres (p. 5). Gender also has an impact on which OTT platforms a person will use, both genders used Amazon Prime Video and Netflix, however females chose Alt-Balaji and ErosNow for romance genre content and males preferred Hotstar for sports content and foreign content (Moochhala, 2018, p. 6).

Malewar and Bajaj (2020) also aimed to identify the factors that impacted customers to adopt and use OTT services. Their respondents were almost equally divided by gender, and they found that while females were influenced by social media promotion to use OTT services, males were not (Malewar & Bajaj, 2020, p. 99-100). According to their data, respondents between the ages of 17 years and 25 years were influenced by their watching habits, while respondents above the age 25 years were influenced by performance, price value, and content availability influenced their usage of OTT platforms (Malewar & Bajaj, 2020, p. 100). The results of Malewar and Bajaj’s research agrees with most of the existing literature, while adding some points of their own.

Tanya Khatri (2021) identifies the factors that influence consumers’ decision to subscribe to OTT services or not. In her research, Khatri found that two factors play a role in the decision making when compared with a customer’s gender. The subscription fees of the services and the availability of (specifically) international content play a role in whether customers will subscribe to OTT services (Khatri, 2021, p. 800). From her results, she found that males are more interested in the subscription costs and the international content (Khatri, 2021, p. 800). Other factors such as local content availability, popularity of the platform, etc. do not play a significant role when compared to gender.

Deborah Cornelious’ (2019) article in The Hindu discusses the viewership habits in different states and OTT platforms. She states that women are consuming more online entertainment content than men. 45% of Hotstar’s consumer base is women, and they are watching more sports - based content as well (Cornelious, 2019). Apart from women watching sports media, there is an equal number of men and women watching other genres, such as drama, thriller, etc. (Cornelious, 2019). She also mentions that there is more room for growth of the consumer base of OTT platforms.

Sabine Reich (2021) explores how gender impacts the viewing habits of consumers. Reich (2021) finds that gender preferences fit the general stereotypes, i.e., men tend to prefer more violent and arousing content whereas women prefer to watch content that is romantic and generally calm. She explains that while men choose to watch more violent content (than women), this gap of choice between men and women reduces with increasing age, which means that older men do not enjoy violent content as younger men do. Reich (2021) has similar findings for negative emotional content. She found that more women prefer dramatic or romantic content than men; and men prefer to maintain their negative emotion of anger whereas women prefer to relieve that anger with happy content (Reich, 2021).

Gangwar, et al. (2020) discuss the aspects that have an impact on the OTT market in India. The authors found that affordability of OTT services plays a role in subscription of customers to OTT services. However, gender does not have any significant impact on how customers consider the affordability of OTT services (Gangwar, et al., 2020, p. 5131). Their research similarly showed that gender does not largely impact the preference of OTT platforms for consumers (Gangwar, et al., 2020, p. 5120). The authors have similar results with other factors such as the available content, convenience, etc. These findings seem to be in contrast to the finding of Khatri (2021), especially in regards to affordability and content availability.

VI. RESEARCH DESIGN

Research design is focused on the various research methodologies and frameworks used by the researcher to conduct their research. Research analyses which design would be the most effective for the research conducted would be the most fruitful for their research.

1. Study Design and Setting: For this research, the researchers found that descriptive and analytical research were the most effective. The data collected was primary data through a Google Form questionnaire that was sent out through WhatsApp and other social media. The research focused on comparing respondents’ gender with their preference of entertainment platforms, content availability, content quality, convenience of use, and customer service.
2. Sample and Sampling Techniques: The researchers understood whether gender plays a role when choosing between DTH and OTT services on the basis of the aforementioned parameters. Simple Random Sampling was the method of sampling in this paper and had a sample size of 307 respondents. This particular research design helped to prove the alternate hypotheses.

VII. DATA ANALYSIS TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES

The tools used for this paper were the Pearson Chi Square test. This test is used to understand the relationship between the chosen variables as well as the difference between the observed and expected frequencies of the same variables.

In this paper, the Pearson Chi Square test was used to understand the relationship between the participants’ gender and their Preference of Entertainment Platforms, Content Availability, Content Quality, Convenience of Use, and Customer Service of DTH and OTT services.

VIII.  ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION

A. Descriptive Analysis

Descriptive analysis is focused on statistical summaries that qualitatively describes data from the collection of information. It is the representation and summarization of data points from a data set collected from a sample.

In this pie chart, the color blue represents Male and red represents Female. It can be seen in Figure 1, that 55.4% participants are Female and 44.6% of the participants who are male respondents, when asked about their gender.

In this bar diagram, the color blue represents Female and orange represents Male. It can be seen in Figure 2, that 139 participants out of 307 are Female and prefer OTT and the remaining 31 participants prefer DTH and 103 participants out of 307 are Male and prefer OTT and the remaining 34 participants prefer DTH, when asked about their preference in OTT or DTH.

B. Inferential Analysis

Inferential analysis are statistical tools which are used to allow one to draw inferences or conclusions from the data, and draw associations between variables.

Table 1

Chi Square Test: Hypotheses and Results

Sources: collected and computed through questionnaire.

Significant at P <0.05 - Rejected, Non-Significant at P >0.05 - Accepted

IX. RESULT OF HYPOTHESES

1. Result 1. A chi-square test of independence was performed to examine the relation between the gender of respondents and the entertainment platform that respondents prefer. The relationship between these variables was not significant, X2 (1, N=307) = 1.890, p = .169. The null hypothesis was accepted. There is no significant association between gender and preference for watching entertainment platforms.
2. Result 2. A chi-square test of independence was performed to examine the relation between the gender of respondents and the content availability of entertainment platforms. The relationship between these variables was not significant, X2 (1, N=307) = .000, p = .997. The null hypothesis was accepted. There is no significant association between gender and content availability of entertainment platforms.
3. Result 3. A chi-square test of independence was performed to examine the relation between the gender of respondents and the content quality of entertainment platforms. The relationship between these variables was not significant, X2 (1, N=307) = .005, p = .941. The null hypothesis was accepted. There is no significant association between gender and the content quality of entertainment platforms.
4. Result 4. A chi-square test of independence was performed to examine the relation between the gender of respondents and the affordability of entertainment platforms. The relationship between these variables was not significant, X2 (1, N=307) = 1.391, p = .238. The null hypothesis was accepted. There is no significant association between gender and the affordability of entertainment platforms.
5. Result 5. A chi-square test of independence was performed to examine the relation between the gender of respondents and the affordability of entertainment platforms. The relationship between these variables was not significant, X2 (1, N=307) = .866, p = .352. The null hypothesis was accepted. There is no significant association between gender and customer service of entertainment platforms.

X. INTERPRETATION AND DISCUSSION

Using the above data, it can be seen that the parameters taken into consideration for this paper to understand the individual’s preferences, while choosing between OTT and DTH services are not affected by gender. Figure 2 shows the consumer preferences on the basis of gender. The table shows that after performing the Chi Square test, all of the null hypotheses have been accepted, highlighting how there is no significant association of gender with the various parameters considered in the paper.

Gangwar, et al. (2020) have results that concur with the results of this research. They also found that the gender of a consumer does not play a major role on how they view OTT platforms on the basis of its affordability, content availability, convenience, etc.

With the understanding gathered from the data, we can say that gender does not play a crucial role in the preference of viewership of OTT and DTH, when it comes to the parameters of availability and quality of content, affordability and customer service.

Conclusion

As we can see, there is a shifting trend in the entertainment sources, where more people are signing up for OTT. We wanted to understand if certain factors play a major role in this change and if these factors are causing this change. This paper has focused on understanding if there is a relationship between the gender of respondents and their preference of OTT and DTH and if gender plays a role in the change of preference, specific to parameters of content availability, content quality, affordability, and customer service of two entertainment services- DTH and OTT. From the data collected, and the results obtained, it could be seen that gender does not play a major role, when it comes to respondent preference, as well as, in the other parameters considered for this paper. The results of this research have proved each of the null hypotheses because the analyses show that there was no significant association between gender and respondent preference for entertainment sources, its content availability, content quality, affordability, and customer service of DTH and OTT services.

References

[1] Cornelious, D. (2019, December 11). Women consume more online content. The Hindu. https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/mumbai/women-in-state-consume-more-online-content/article30271455.ece [2] Gangwar, V., Sudhagoni, V., Adepu, N., & Bellamkonda, S. (2020). Profiles and preferences of OTT users in Indian perspective. European Journal of Molecular & Clinical Medicine, 7(8), 5106-5142. https://ejmcm.com/pdf_7583_35d794dd02227a2ca49548f57c76a2c5.html [3] Gender. (2021). WHO. Retrieved December 16, 2021, From https://www.who.int/health-topics/gender#tab=tab_1 [4] Khatri, T. (2021). Understanding Adoption Factors of Subscription Based Entertainment Services Among Consumers in India. IT in Industry, 9 (1), 795-809. http://it-in-industry.org/index.php/itii/article/view/200/180 [5] Malewar, S. & Bajaj, S. (2020). Acceptance of OTT video streaming platforms on India during covid-19: Extending UTAUT2 with content availability. Journal of Content, Community & Communication, 12, 89-106. DOI: 10.31620/JCCC.12.20/09 [6] Moochhala, Q. (2018). The future of online OTT entertainment services in India. Actionesque Consulting, Pune- India. https://actionesque.com/research-papers_pdf/QM-OTT-future-2018.pdf [7] Novi Digital Entertainment Private Limited. (2019, December). India Watch Report. https://secure-media.hotstar.com/media-website/indiawatchreport2019/India_Watch_Report_2019.pdf [8] Reich, Sabine. (2019). A Systematic Gender Perspective on Entertainment Theory. Oxford University Press https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335831116_A_Systematic_Gender_Perspective_on_Entertainment_Theory

Copyright

Copyright © 2022 Ms. Jui Chitre, Ms. Janhavi Mahale, Ms. Sahifa Moosa Muradbi Mazgaonkar. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.