The overall objective of the study was to determine attitude of audience members to Gulder Ultimate Search 2 Reality TV show. In an earlier exploratory study on the first edition of the show, I had discovered that even though respondents were enamored by the show this did not translate to favorable attitude to the brand – Gulder Beer - which the show was created to market (Akpabio 2004:223). An important unanswered question in the first study was whether this attitude was also present in the general population other that the undergraduate students who constituted the study’s respondents. Therefore, the hypothesis the study sought to test was that there will exist no significant relationship between exposure to the show and attitude towards Gulder Beer. The study also sought answers to audience members’ attitude to the reality show. Using multi-stage cluster sampling, six hundred respondents were randomly selected for the study. The findings indicate favorable attitude to the show and the brand as audience members utilized the show for their own ends – information and advice for coping with life’s challenges.
Even though only a slight majority of respondents indicated that exposure to the show influenced their consumption of Gulder Beer, it is apparent that the novelty of the shows and its use to market the brand must be an important contributory factor to the study’s outcome especially since the current stage of media effect research indicates that the context of communication is critical in any discussion of media effects.