Research means finding out information to inform your planning and design decisions for a media product, so your choices are based on evidence rather than guesses. It is not only about collecting facts: research also shapes the design, content and planning choices you make.
Understand the target audience. Research tells you what your audience likes, wants and expects. If you know they prefer short, funny videos to long explanations, you can make those choices early, so the product appeals to them and they keep watching.
Check that facts are accurate. Anything you publish can be seen by a wide audience, so wrong information damages trust and can mislead people. Checking a fact before it is published helps you avoid errors that are hard to take back.
Gather ideas and examples. Looking at existing products and styles gives you options for your own work. You might notice a clever way to open a podcast or a colour scheme that suits a poster, which you can then adapt during planning.
Reduce the risk of an unwanted product. Without research, you might spend time and money on something the client or audience does not want. Research lowers that risk before production begins, when changes are still cheap.
For example, a youth theatre wants a poster for its summer show. Research shows the audience is mostly 12 to 16 year olds who prefer bold artwork and a clear date over a long paragraph, and checking the show dates and times with the venue prevents a wrong detail going on 200 posters. That evidence makes the poster more appealing, accurate and less likely to be rejected.
Primary research is first-hand information collected for a specific purpose. It is not simply research done first; it comes directly from the target audience or an original source, such as the people who use a product or the person who witnessed an event.
Because the organisation designs the questions and records the answers itself, the information is current and fits the exact question being answered. The organisation also owns the results, so competitors cannot simply use the same findings. Since you know how the information was collected, primary research can be more reliable than data whose origins are unclear, provided the method is sound.
For example, a games studio might ask its own players how clear a new tutorial is. If it only asks twelve players, their answers may not match the views of thousands of other players, so the small sample limits how far the findings can be trusted.
Primary data is data collected first-hand by the researcher. In the games example, the players' answers are primary data because the studio collected them directly for its own purpose.
Secondary research uses information that already exists and has been interpreted or analysed by someone else. That information is secondary data: data collected by another person, rather than by you for this project. It is not simply the research you happen to do second.
Imagine you are planning a short film about food waste in your area. You find a national charity's report with yearly figures and a magazine article describing a similar school project. Both are secondary sources. They usually take minutes to find and often cost nothing, and the charity's report covers thousands of homes you could never visit yourself. That is the main strength: secondary research is quick, cheap and plentiful.
| Advantage | Why it helps |
|---|---|
| Quick and easy | Existing information can be searched and read straight away. |
| Usually cheap or free | Many reports, articles and websites cost little or nothing to use. |
| Lots available | You can find information on almost any topic. |
| Wider reach | Other people may have studied places or groups you cannot access yourself. |
| Disadvantage | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| May be out of date | The situation may have changed since it was published. |
| Collected for another purpose | It may not answer your exact question or fit your audience. |
| May be biased or inaccurate | The author may push a particular view or make mistakes. |
| Available to competitors | Rival companies can read the same public information, so it gives you no private advantage. |
| Method may be unknown | You cannot always tell how the data was collected or who was asked. |
In the film example, the charity's report may be several years old and written to persuade people to waste less, so its figures are presented in a way that supports that aim. You also cannot see its survey questions, so you do not know who was asked. A respected source is often reliable, but check a second, more recent source to confirm the facts still hold.
A focus group is a planned discussion with a small group of carefully selected people who reflect the target audience. It is a primary research method used to collect detailed opinions and reactions, rather than numbers.
Choose participants who represent the audience you want to reach, then plan the questions and topics for the session. During the discussion, ask questions and record the responses so they can be reviewed later. Participants give their own views and respond to each other, which can reveal more than one-to-one answers would.
You can show a focus group an early idea, such as a poster design or a prototype app screen, and ask what they like, dislike or would change. This helps identify desirable features before time and money are spent on production.
For example, a youth theatre wants to redesign its booking page. It invites eight teenagers who already book tickets to discuss two early designs, and asks follow-up questions when someone says a design feels confusing.
Focus groups give detailed information because people can explain their views and build on other people's comments. The discussion leader can ask follow-up questions to clarify an answer or find out why someone reacted in a certain way, so focus groups are useful for understanding feelings and opinions.
A focus group uses only a small number of people, so its views may not represent the whole audience. Setting one up may take a lot of time and money, especially if you need a venue, refreshments or payment for participants. A few confident people may dominate, while quieter people simply agree with them, which can make the views one-sided. The answers are qualitative, so they are harder to analyse than numerical survey results.
An interview is a conversation between an interviewer and a person who has knowledge or experience of the topic. It is a primary research method because it gathers first-hand views or the original words of someone involved.
Interviews produce detailed, in-depth answers. You can ask follow-up questions when a reply is unclear or interesting, so you can explore why someone thinks or behaves in a certain way. Because the answers come from an expert or someone directly involved, they give you first-hand views rather than second-hand opinions.
For example, if you are planning a podcast for teenagers, you might interview a youth worker who runs a local club. Their answers can explain what young people actually listen to and why, and you can ask them to expand on a point straight away.
Interviews are time-consuming: arranging, carrying out and writing up each one takes effort, so you can usually interview only a few people. A small number of interviews may not represent a whole audience.
Some participants might not tell the truth, or might give the answers they believe the person asking would like to hear. The person asking the questions can also sway replies through the wording of questions or by their reactions, which introduces bias. Interview answers are usually descriptive or opinion-based, so they are harder to analyse than numerical data such as percentages or ratings.
Prepare questions before you start, covering the information you need without leading the person. Hold a natural conversation, listen carefully and use follow-ups to clarify answers. Record the answers accurately, for example by taking notes or making an audio recording with permission, so you can analyse them afterwards.
An online survey asks a sample of people from a larger population a series of questions through a website or app, and a computer program then collates and analyses the answers. Because answers are stored digitally, survey software can collate them straight away.
You write the questions, publish the survey online, share the link (by email, social media or a QR code on a poster) and collect the responses. Survey software then adds up the answers and draws charts, so a thousand replies can be turned into statistics in seconds:
ratings = [4, 5, 3, 5, 2, 4, 5] # star ratings from survey replies
responses = len(ratings)
average = sum(ratings) / responses
print("Responses collected:", responses)
print("Average rating:", round(average, 2))Output:
Responses collected: 7
Average rating: 4.0Surveys are strong for quantitative statistics and concrete results, such as “62% of players would pay for extra levels”. A survey used to produce statistics, though, may not be scientifically high quality: with a small or unrepresentative sample, or leading questions, the figures can look convincing while proving very little.
A questionnaire is a written set of questions used to gather people's views. Many questionnaires use tick boxes with a set of possible answers, so everyone answers the same questions in the same way.
Writing a questionnaire is cheap and simple: you create the questions once and print as many copies as you need. Because every person reads identical wording, the answers slot together neatly and are easy to compare. Closed tick-box questions give quantitative data, which is quick to count and turn into charts.
Paper questionnaires reach people who are not online, such as older members of a community. And because they can be anonymous, people may answer sensitive questions more honestly than they would face to face.
For example, a youth theatre group planning its next season could hand a one-page questionnaire to the audience at the interval, asking which night of the week suits them best and how they travel to the venue. The tick boxes take seconds to complete and the results can be totalled straight after the show.
Printing and distributing paper copies takes time and money, and someone must tally each form and key the answers in, which is slow with hundreds of responses. Response rates can be low — many people ignore a form handed to them — so the results may only reflect the keenest few.
People fill in a questionnaire alone, so if a question is unclear they cannot ask for help and may guess or skip it.
Closed questions limit answers to the boxes you offered, so you may miss a reason you never thought of; open questions let people write freely but give qualitative answers that are slow to read and hard to compare. A questionnaire is not automatically quantitative: it depends on the questions you ask.
Books and journals are existing written sources you can use when researching a media product. They are useful when you need background knowledge, expert explanation or evidence to support an idea.
A book usually analyses and interprets primary or secondary sources, pulling information together into a longer explanation. Because publishers have editors who check facts and improve accuracy, books are generally reputable. They are also detailed and in-depth: one book can cover a whole topic thoroughly, which helps you understand context before you plan a product. For example, a book about the design of escape rooms might explain how puzzles are built up and interpret interviews with designers, giving you a strong overview. The downside is that books can be out of date, especially in fast-changing areas such as technology, and they can be expensive or hard to access if your school or local library does not stock them.
Academic journals publish papers based on research by experts. A peer-reviewed paper has been checked by other experts before publication, who look at the research methods and claims. This makes journals some of the most respected sources you can use. For example, a journal paper might report a study of how viewers respond to different colours in app adverts, with the method and results explained in detail. However, journals share the same practical problems: research can take months to publish, so findings may be out of date, and subscriptions can be expensive or hard to access.
Even reputable publishers and journals can make mistakes, and fraudulent research can occasionally get through. Peer review and editing make problems less likely, but they do not make a source perfect.
Internet sites are pages, articles, videos and forums published online. They are one of the most common places to research a media product, and they are quick, wide-ranging and free — but anyone can publish, so you must judge how far to trust each one.
Anyone can publish on the internet. No editor checks a personal blog or a random forum post before it appears, so information may be inaccurate (wrong figures, or mistakes copied from page to page), biased (written to sell something or push one opinion) or fake (invented to attract clicks).
Reliability varies by type of site. A government health page, a university department site or a long-established news organisation normally has checks in place; a post from an account with no name behind it, or a page someone set up last weekend, may have none.
Because of this, a fact found online needs checking with a second source that is independent of the first. Suppose a fan site claims a new game cost £150 million to make. Before you quote that in a feature, find out who runs the site and look for the same figure from an independent industry source.
Internet research is usually secondary, because someone else has already gathered and written the information. But whether a site gives you primary or secondary material depends on its content, not on the fact that it is online: a museum page publishing visitor figures its own staff counted at the doors is primary material, while a travel blog that gathers up other people's reviews of the same museum is secondary.
Magazines and newspapers are a secondary research source. Journalists gather information from reports, interviews and events, then write articles that reuse, analyse or comment on those primary sources.
They are current: daily papers and weekly or monthly magazines cover events and releases soon after they happen, so you can find recent opinions rather than years-old facts. They are also easy to access — in shops, libraries and on websites or apps, often without paying.
They are useful for opinions, reviews and trends aimed at a particular audience. A gardening magazine's article on the rise of young allotment growers, for example, tells you what new gardeners care about, and a local paper's article on a new swimming pool shows how residents feel about it. That helps you shape a product that suits your audience.
Bias can creep in because ownership affects editorial decisions. A newspaper owned by a property company may give generous coverage to that company's new housing plan. Articles can also be sensationalised, with exaggerated headlines or selective facts to attract readers — a headline shouting "Chaos on the roads" may sit above a story about mild delays.
An article is an interpretation, not first-hand evidence: the journalist chooses what to include and how to frame it. A published article is not automatically reliable, so check its validity by comparing it with a second source or a fact-checking site, and by looking at who owns the publication and when it was written.
One page can hold both types of source. An original photograph of a town's new cycle lane, or the reporter's own interview with a market trader about rising stall rents, is primary material because it is first-hand. The article written around it is still secondary.
Television is a secondary source when a programme presents someone's opinions or analysis rather than the original material itself. For example, a review programme where a food critic gives their verdict on a city's new restaurants is offering their judgement, not first-hand evidence.
The same broadcast can contain primary material when it shows original footage or unedited first-hand content. A live, unedited broadcast from a robotics competition, where you see the machines move exactly as they did, is primary material within the programme.
Television gives up-to-date news and current affairs, so it can tell you what is happening now. Documentary cameras can take you into real locations and show processes as they happen, for example by following the daily work inside a wildlife hospital, so a setting is easier to picture. Because it reaches large audiences, television also reflects and spreads mainstream views: what many people are discussing and what counts as a common opinion.
Television may be biased: presenters, guests and commentary can push one opinion, so the picture you get may be one-sided. Content is also edited, with clips chosen, cut and arranged, so it can give a selective view even when the footage is real. Being shown on television does not make a claim reliable; check who made the programme and what evidence it offers.
A broadcast is hard to reference or check later unless you record it or find it on a catch-up service. A one-off transmission is not like a page you can revisit and quote easily.
Quantitative data is information that can be measured and written as numbers. It relates to quantity, so it is numerical or statistical: you can count it, compare amounts and work out averages or percentages. For example, a survey for a youth club might ask how many evenings a week you would use a new games room; answers such as 2 or 4 are quantitative.
Qualitative data describes the quality of something. It covers information that cannot be expressed as numbers, such as feelings, opinions, reasons and descriptions. The same survey could ask what you enjoy about the games room. Answers like “it is a friendly place to meet friends” or “the equipment is too old” are qualitative because they describe and explain rather than count.
| Type of data | What it tells you | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Quantitative | A number or statistic, such as how many, how often or how much | 18 club members said they would attend on Fridays. |
| Qualitative | A description or opinion in words, such as why someone feels a certain way | “Friday is best because I have no homework that night.” |
A single questionnaire can collect both kinds of data at once. Closed questions that ask for a number or an amount, such as how often or how many, give quantitative data, while open questions with a comment box usually give qualitative data. Using both helps you understand what is happening and why. For example, a museum could ask how many times visitors have been in the last year, then ask which exhibition they enjoyed most and why. The counts show repeat visits; the descriptions explain what made an impression.
A reliable source is one you can trust to support a fact in your research. One source on its own is not enough: use a second source to verify the fact. The second source should be independent, meaning it does not simply repeat the first source or come from the same organisation. For example, if a local news website says a new skate park will open in June, compare that with the council's planning page and a separate report from another news organisation.
To judge reliability, consider the type of media source and its reputation. A national broadcaster with trained reporters and a corrections policy is usually stronger evidence than an unattributed leaflet handed out in the street. A source is not reliable just because it is printed, published or shown on television.
Also think about the company or group that runs the media outlet. Ownership can affect editorial decisions, such as which stories are chosen, how they are worded and which opinions are given space. A magazine owned by a company may present that company's products more positively than an independent title would.
Fact-checking sites can help you test claims, especially viral stories, videos and images. You can also use other sources to verify a story, video or image: look for the original upload, a trustworthy report from a different organisation, or compare details with a separate eyewitness account from someone not connected to the claim. If you are using secondary sources, find relevant ones, check their reliability, then compare the information with another source before you rely on it.