Syracuse University to receive grant for simultaneous media usage data

Wednesday, March 31, 2004, By News Staff

Syracuse University to receive grant for simultaneous media usage dataMarch 31, 2004Amy Schmitzaemehrin@syr.edu

Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications will receive a grant from BIGresearch, the nation’s leading consumer intelligence firm, for the latest Simultaneous Media (SIMM) Usage Study data. The grant will be used in Newhouse’s MS in new media curriculum.

The grant, valued at $120,000, will allow students to demonstrate consumers’ media usage patterns and their impact on content and advertising.

“Any serious research into today’s media environment has to examine consumer behavior,” says Prof. Stephen Masiclat, director of the MS in new media program and co-director of the University’s Convergence Center. “The SIMM data clearly indicates that how consumers process information and use different forms of media in tandem. It is a persistent and evolving behavior that, as we know, plays a large part in how they spend money. The question of how to design communication that reaches them in this fluid environment will occupy us for some time.”

SU was ranked #1 in television and radio studies in 2002 by U.S. News & World Report. Graduate programs in public relations and advertising were ranked #3 and #10 respectively in the nation, as well, making the school a natural choice for the grant, said BIGresearch Vice President Joe Pilotta.

“Syracuse is a leader on both the business and creative sides of the industry,” Pilottasays. “This affords BIGresearch an exceptional and unique opportunity to look at both areas through the lens of SIMM and demonstrate how simultaneous media usage impacts the entire industry.”

BIGresearch is a market intelligence firm providing analysis of consumer behavior in the areas of retail, politics and media. The twice-annual SIMM survey quantifies how the public consumes media and the impact those patterns have on buying habits in a fragmented and changing marketplace. For more information visit http:// www.bigresearch.com.