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General attitudes towards the BBC

This section has our annual tracking reports on the BBC's Public Purposes as well as research conducted on Digital Britain and Media Literacy.

Attitudes towards the BBC's public purposes

In order for the BBC to fulfil its mission to inform, educate and entertain, the Royal Charter and Agreement sets out six public purposes.

The Trust has set remits for these public purposes, and in order to monitor the performance of the BBC in delivering the purposes, the Trust carries out an annual tracking survey. This research asks respondents to express their views on both the importance they attach to the purpose priorities and on the BBC's current effectiveness in delivering them.

There are a few purpose priorities which the BBC Trust is committed to assessing performance through other means, for example qualitative research. This is generally where there is no suitable survey question for that priority, or the data is best gathered from existing sources, or where the subject itself lends itself to further in-depth investigation.

Annual tracking reports

2009/10

2008/09

2007/08

2007

Qualitative research to explore perceptions of innovation and distinctiveness

A key finding from the Annual Tracking Survey, which gauges the public's attitudes on how well the BBC is delivering the purposes, is that there is a negative perception on how well the BBC provides fresh and new ideas. In order to understand what is driving this perception, we commissioned qualitative research to explore this further with the audience.

Assessing the BBC's performance against the Trust's strategic priorities (2007/08)

The objective of this research was to involve licence fee payers in a deliberative event to give the BBC Trust a more in-depth understanding of how licence fee payers felt the BBC had been performing since the publication of the previous Annual Report.

Media literacy research

The annual Purpose Remit research measures how well audiences believe "the BBC has helped me make the most of new technologies such as interactive TV and the internet". As this is only one element of media literacy, the Trust recognised the need to measure how well the BBC helps its audiences engage critically with media – to find what they are looking for from trustworthy sources, to understand and form an opinion about the information, and where necessary, to respond to and interact with the information. The BBC Trust commissioned some audience research to understand how far audiences feel they have been helped by the BBC to evaluate and engage with the many sources of content available through digital media. The research set out to explore both perceptions of the BBC's performance in addressing media literacy needs across its output, and the importance placed by licence payers on the BBC fulfilling this role.

BBC Diversity Strategy

Report on findings from research into the BBC's Diversity Strategy

The Trust has approved a BBC Diversity Strategy effective through to 2015. As part of this process, with the BBC's Diversity Centre we jointly commissioned a large-scale qualitative research study to engage and involve a wide range of audiences in the development of the strategy. This research included interviews and workshops involving different types of audience including those who can sometimes be overlooked in general research such as transgender people, disabled audiences, people from rural communities and lesbian, gay and bisexual people. The research also included interviews with third sector organisations and some BBC staff.

Digital Britain

Research to inform the BBC's submission to Digital Britain

In September 2009, as part of its submission to the Government's Digital Britain consultation on funding options for national, regional and local news, the Trust commissioned independent research into UK adults' attitudes to the Government's proposals and the use of licence fee money, both before and after digital switchover is completed. The research used a mixed qualitative and quantitative methodology consisting of a nationally representative omnibus survey and deliberative workshops.

Trust in media

In November 2007, the Trust commissioned a qualitative research project into the public's understanding and perception of trust in television broadcasting. The research explored: attitudes to various aspects of life to better understand levels of trust, cynicism and engagement; the present attitudes and perceptions of broadcasters in terms of trust, following press coverage; and attitudes to editorial principles or programme-making practices.

Trust in media

Strategy review

In July 2009, we asked the BBC Executive to undertake a full-scale review of the BBC's strategy, to decide what the future direction of the corporation ought to be. In March 2010, they outlined the findings of the strategy review including a number of proposals. The Trust began an assessment of this review which included consulting the public and commissioning independent audience research. The Trust published its final conclusions in December 2010.

Strategy review stage one research - content

The purpose of this research was to explore licence fee payers' attitudes towards the strategy review proposals which impacted specifically on BBC services and the quality of the output.

Strategy review stage two research - accessibility and distribution

The purpose of this research was to explore licence fee payers' attitudes towards the strategy review proposals which impacted specifically on the accessibility and distribution of BBC services.

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