Watching commercials makes TV more enjoyable

February 24, 10:25 AMScience News ExaminerMeg Marquardt

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Last week, I did something strange: I watched an episode of Bones  while it was actually airing.  And every time the commercials cut in, I pushed the fast forward button at least three times before I remembered I wasn’t watching the show via the DVR and so couldn’t skip the commercials.  About halfway through the episode, I got so miffed at seeing the same Verizon commercial for the third time that I actually called up a recorded episode of Chuck and watched that through (vindictively skipping the commercials) until I could finish Bones on the DVR.

So, needless to say, I find this study surprising.

Researchers at University of California San Diego and New York University conducted a set of experiments to learn how commercials affected viewing enjoyment.  They found that although participants watching an episode of Taxi “disliked the commercials, those who watched the show with commercials liked it better than those who watched it without... [another study even] found that participants who watched an interrupted version of a nature documentary not only enjoyed the documentary more, but were also willing to donate more to a nature charity after viewing”  [EurkeAlert]

The hypothesis is that when people watch TV, their minds acclimate.  We become slightly less interested as each minute passes and our minds adapt to what we are watching.  So commercial breaks are like a reset button; as soon as they’re over, we’re more ready to fully reengage whatever show we were watching.  And it doesn’t even have to be commercials. Researchers found that non-commercial interruptions had the same effect.  

For a while, I thought maybe my adverse reaction to commercials had something to do with age, that that it was due to the fact that I come from a generation that believes firmly in instant gratification.  But once again, the study surprised me.  According to the researchers, “commercial interruptions made a video clip more enjoyable for younger consumers than older consumers.” [EurekAlert]

However, one part of the study may explain how I felt towards commercials during a show like Bones:  "Very fast-paced and complex shows, such as "24," probably do not benefit from commercial interruptions since viewers are unlikely to adapt to these shows. However, we do find that commercial interruptions, although universally shunned, do make a wide variety of shows more enjoyable, including sitcoms, animations, documentaries, and music videos," the authors conclude. [EurekAlert]

So the next time you tune into a sitcom (I highly recommend The Big Bang Theory if you’re looking for a good sitcom to watch), stick it out through the commercials.  You may find that you enjoy it all the more.