A Study of Preferences among University Students towards different Dimensions of FM Programs

Abstract

This study was carried out to know the preferences of university students towards different programmes aired by FM stations.  Findings of this study would be useful for the FM stations to identify their users and their preferences in developing their programme contents.  A random sample of 80 university students including 20 men and 20 women from undergraduate as well as from post-graduate programmes were selected for this study. The mean (± SD) age of the undergraduate students was 18.9yrs (±1.3yrs) whereas mean age of post-graduate students was 23.3yrs (±1.9yrs). It was hypothesised that the preferences of male and female would be different on most of the parameters of the FM programmes. It was further hypothesised that there would be significant difference in the preferences of undergraduate and postgraduate students on different parameters of the of FM stations.The data were analysed by computing descriptive statistics and using two-way analysis of variance. In only two parameters, attitude of men were found to be different than women. In comparison to women men were of the strong opinion that FM stations should provide an opportunity to its listeners to interact with celebrities. Further, Boys strongly desired that FM stations must operate for 24 × 7.  The analysis of data further revealed that the attitude of post-graduate students were more positive than that of  undergraduate students on the issues like; presentation style of Radio Jockey’s (RJ) is the key to popularize FM stations, FM stations should provide incentive to its listeners, arranging interactions dialogues between celebrities and listeners, RJ^s communication to be more clear and melodious, FM to provide info for more shopping offers and RJ^s to speak in an understandable language preferably in Hindi.