New Study Sees Difference Between Passive & Active Music Listeners
If you’ve ever wondered, “How can people listen to that crap?”, and certainly that phrase has entered most music listener’s minds at some point, it’s because different music listeners inherently want different things from the music experience, and certain songs and artists appeal to those different types of listeners. Ratings groups like Nielsen heretofore have almost solely focused on demographics as a way to track and rate the music experience for listeners, breaking down people by age group and gender primarily. But none of that takes into consideration that some listeners want something deep out of their musical experience, and others just want it as background noise to help get them through their busy days—in other words, the difference between active music listeners and passive music listeners.
Well now Nielsen has opened up a new field in how music listeners can be measured. In a new study called the “Audio Demand Landscape“, Nielsen has broken up listeners into distinct categories not factoring age or sex whatsoever. For Nielsen’s purposes, since they desire to factor in all of listening, including political, news, and sports talk, and especially the new technologies people are using to listen to media, it goes beyond the two worlds of passive and active fans. But the study still give new insight into the culture divide that delineates passive and active listeners.
Nielsen broke down listeners into six distinct categories:
- Music Loving Personalizers
- Discriminating Audiophiles
- Convenience Seeking Traditionalists
- Information Seeking Loyalists
- Background Driving Defaulters
- Techie Audio Enthusiasts
Though some of these categories deal with how people listen to audio instead of what, or deal more with the sports/news/talk realm, the categories of “Discriminating Audiophiles” and “Background Driving Defaulters” make near perfect definitions between fans who might find appeal in music that really speaks to them and has something to say, and fans who simply want to bob their heads to something catchy on the way home.
“Descriminating Audiofiles” in the study are defined as, “Highly engaged consumers who listen to and prefer a wide variety of audio, and are willing to pay for specific content.”
“Background Driving Defaulters” are described as, “Less engaged and typically have the radio on in the car for background entertainment or occasionally news and information.”
“Music Loving Personalizers” could also be considered part of the active listening population, and are described by Nielsen as being “passionate music listeners who are mainly seeking an emotional benefit by listening.”
The “traditionalist” word in “Convenience Seeking Traditionalists” is not as much about what these listeners listen to, but how they prefer more traditional media, such as radio to listen, while “Techie Audio Enthusiasts” are all about the new device or streaming service to enhance their musical experience. “Information Seeing Loyalists” are mostly interested in news and other talk radio.
Though the Nielsen study isn’t perfect in describing the difference between passive and active music fans and deals with a much larger range of topics facing the listening habits of consumers, for the first time we have a study that sees the clear divide between people who see music as an important aspect to their lives, and people who simply see it simply as background noise. This difference is one of the biggest factors, if not the biggest factor in the widening culture war with music as one of the main battlefronts. “Not all audio consumers are after the same thing,” the study says, “And their specific wants and desires motivate them to use many kinds of audio.”
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Nielsen’s Audio Demand Landscape was developed from a survey of an online panel of 4,950 Americans aged 18-74 conducted in English during March 2014 about their audio listening attitudes, motivations, behaviors, habits and preferences.
Joshua Wallace
June 27, 2014 @ 12:03 pm
I think I’d be an odd mix of Music Loving Personalizer, Discriminating Audiophiles and Techie Audio Enthusiasts. I do listen to music for an emotional benefit, but I’m also a highly engaged consumer who will listen to and prefers a wide variety of audio, and I am willing to pay for specific content. Yet, I am also often an early adopter and I’m not afraid to try new tech. Oh and I do enjoy music as background entertainment too…..So yeah…..I’m an oddball. Did I just break Neilson’s classification system?
Synthetic Paper
June 27, 2014 @ 12:33 pm
Hmm, I’d say I am somewhere between “Music Loving Personalizer” and “Discriminating Audiophile”, more highly favoring the latter.
Gena R.
June 27, 2014 @ 1:22 pm
Same here; though I do a fair bit of free streaming (on YouTube, Grooveshark, SoundCloud, etc.) to sample stuff, but I usually end up buying the stuff I really like.
Matt
June 29, 2014 @ 7:32 pm
I’d classify myself in the exact same way.
Melissa
June 27, 2014 @ 1:13 pm
“Music Loving Personalizers” fits me best. While I’ve never been the definition of a passive listener, I miss the days when I COULD “passively” listen to country radio and all I had to turn off were the ads, cause the music ranged from great to at least listenable. Now it mostly ranges from listenable to ear-blisteringly awful, and more skewed towards the bottom end. No more passive listening for me. I gotta say, I miss that a lot. Good music shouldn’t be so hard to find! (This site helps, though. :))
Melissa
June 27, 2014 @ 3:32 pm
Thinking about this, it also helps explain why I and other “emotional” listeners feel such a profound disconnect from today’s popular music: its lack of any kind of emotional awareness or connection. This is especially jarring in country music, which has always had strong emotional content for the most part.
Eric
June 27, 2014 @ 3:59 pm
The loss of melody in modern music is, in my opinion, the key behind the loss of emotional connection with the songs. Sentimentality has been replaced by danceability (not that there weren’t dance songs in previous eras, but now it seems like they have monopolized music).
For the last decade or so, country music was the refuge were emotional songs still dominated. However, in just a matter of 2 years, the identity of country music has completely changed.
Albert
June 27, 2014 @ 4:43 pm
While I’m in complete agreement with your comment on non-existent melody in much COUNTRY music , Eric , I have to respectfully disagree on the ‘dance-ability ‘ factor and have done so on other occasions here on SCM threads .
I play music for a good part of my living and have done so most of my life. A large part of the connection to country music over the decades has been the dance-ability . From waltzes to two steps , polka’s to country rock ,line dancing to slow-dancing to ballads and shuffles , country was king in the dance department . Most new country music is using a ‘southern rock’ rhythm …a half time rhythm which does not lend itself to dancing whatsoever . Watch the award shows and note how people struggle to find a way to move to most of the songs…let alone dance with a partner ( BIG social aspect of the genre over the years …GONE ) At our gigs- clubs , pubs , dance halls, weddings and special occasions – we play to pretty much all ages and the common denominator is that they request ‘older’ country ( 90’s and before ) precisely because of the dance-ability . On the chance that I venture out to a club to hear a country band , they are always playing classic DANCEABLE country music – ‘Tulsa Time’ , ‘Boot Scootin Boogie’, Garth’s ‘Friend’s in Low Places’ or ” Aint Goin’ Down , , AJ’s’ Goodtime’ ,Patsy’s ‘ Crazy’ , Vince’s shuffles , Kenny’s Caribbean -flavoured stuff etc.. No one is asking for the Cruise Kids because it isn’t danceable . I think country music shot itself in the foot ( pun intended ) when it stopped counting dance-ability as a factor in a songs long term exposure and success .
Eric
June 27, 2014 @ 7:54 pm
Interesting and informative comment. I do not dance at all, and so I am somewhat out of my depth on this matter. I am a thoroughly introverted music listener.
jrs
June 27, 2014 @ 5:02 pm
Me too, music loving personalizer. And I gave up on listening to country radio ever again (or until it improves and I’m not holding my breath) this week and it feels good! I don’t mind some of the more poppish stuff. But I’d be happy if I never heard another aweful sexist bro country song again in my life, the percentage of which grew and grew until it dominated everything.
I’ll stick to classic rock, alt rock and classical music which my dails are now tuned to. The rock (though maybe only 1/3 of the new stuff is good) is better and deeper and more emotional and comments on a wider range of life at this point.
Tom
June 28, 2014 @ 1:22 am
I find it interesting that Music Loving Personalizers and Discriminating Audiophiles are the two most common listener groups, and yet the record industry tends to focus on Convenience Seeking Traditionalists at number three and Background Driving Defaulters at number five. According to this, they are abandoning 41% of listeners as they cater to 31%.
Karl
June 28, 2014 @ 7:00 am
NOTA
Adrian
June 29, 2014 @ 11:42 am
Interesting article. Intuitively it makes sense that some listeners actively seek out music, while others prefer to keep the music in the background. I would guess that most pop country, e.g. Carrie Underwood, Taylor Swift, Rascal Flatts, Luke Bryan, Lady Antebellum, etc appeals more to passive listeners.
Eric
June 29, 2014 @ 1:46 pm
Given how well-versed Taylor Swift fans are in her lyrics and how frequently they quote her in their writings, I would argue that they are the very epitome of active listeners.
I agree that Lady Antebellum fans are largely passive listeners.
Carrie Underwood, Rascal Flatts, and Luke Bryan seem to have a mixture of both types of listeners in their fan bases.