• The universe of the study
• Sample size
• Sampling method
• Interviewing method
• Fieldwork
• Weighting method
• Social grades
• Types of analysis available in Sesame
• Verification of compliance with the measurement standards and methodological conditions
   

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The universe of the study

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The annual sample of the study is 11,700 persons

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Sampling method

The sample is random, allocated proportionally to the size of the town.
In the case of towns with more than 30,000 inhabitants, the sampling scheme includes all the towns in the universe. In the case of the urban universe with fewer than 30,000 inhabitants and of the rural universe, localities were selected on a stratified basis, corresponding to the 8 geographic regions (areas that are relatively homogeneous from a socio-economic and cultural point of view).

For each locality in the universe, the sample was drawn in accordance with the rules of probability sampling from the electoral rolls. The sample is allocated proportionally to the size of the locality and drawn at random from the electoral rolls, with a statistical step calculated for each locality in the sample.

Only one person in a household may answer the questionnaire, namely the person who will be the next to celebrate their birthday after the moment of the interviewer's visit.
 

 

The interviews are conducted at the respondent's home and involve the completion of a questionnaire face to face, between the interviewer and the respondent, using a tablet, through the CAPI method (Computer Assisted Personal Interview), whereby the interviewer records the answers in a database through an application. 

For each publication studied, an individual screen was created within the application used to administer the SNA questionnaire. That screen displays the publication's colour logo in a suggestive way, in order to help respondents identify the publications they know and have read or browsed, while drawing attention to possible confusion with the online counterparts of the publications or with programmes with similar titles in other media (TV/radio). For all the interviews, the titles are grouped by frequency of publication, into 3 groups: monthly publications, fortnightly and weekly publications or supplements of dailies, and dailies. A filter question is applied to each publication. Depending on the answer to that question, a further set of 2 readership questions is asked for certain publications. In the case of the filter question, the order of the 3 categories is random from one questionnaire to another, and within a group the publications are shown in random order. In the case of the other readership questions, the order of the publications is given by their frequency, each questionnaire starting with monthly publications, then fortnightly, weekly, dailies and supplements of dailies. Within each category of publications, the order of the titles is random from one interview to another.

The non-response rate for the National Readership Survey is 30%.

Content of the interview:

• Respondent characteristics
• Household characteristics
• Media audiences - print press:
  • AE, CpN, CpA
  • Proportion of pages read
  • Number of times an issue is used
• General media consumption:
  • TV, radio, internet, cinema, outdoor, other media
  • Social networks, audio-video content platforms, podcasts, VOD, communication, etc.
• Sources of information:
  • News and topics of interest
• Ownership of and intention to purchase various goods and services
• Spending on various categories of goods and services

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The fieldwork is shared between 3 research companies, appointed by BRAT following a selection of tenders.

The fieldwork is currently carried out by CSOP, ASKPEOPLE and ISENSE SOLUTIONS.

All the field interviewers conducting interviews for SNA receive special training, based on the manuals drawn up for this study.

The fieldwork is carried out according to a schedule of the number of questionnaires to be completed in each town in the sample, on each day of a study year. Compliance by each research company with this schedule ensures that, across the whole sample, an equal number of questionnaires is completed on each day of the week and an approximately equal number of questionnaires is completed from one month to another.

The daily samples were allocated at random from the total sample

Weighting method
 

The source of the weighting data is the National Institute of Statistics.

Weighting compensates for any deviations that have occurred in the structure of the sample as a result of conducting the interviews in the field.

The weighting variables are: gender, age, size of the locality, historical region, the day of the week on which the interview was conducted and the quarter in which the interview was conducted; the method used for weighting is RIM.

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Given the need for research results to be comparable from one country to another, methods have been developed for standardising certain procedures used in marketing research. For this very reason, as early as 1980 ESOMAR began to investigate the possibility of producing a unified socio-demographic classification system. The result of ESOMAR's work was the development of the "Social Grade" scale. The scale makes it possible to produce a standard socio-demographic classification, that is, a composite variable. With this new variable, sub-samples (for various markets) can be created that are comparable with one another, and the sub-groups thus defined are also comparable from one country to another.
Among other socio-demographic data, the National Readership Survey also provides information on the social grade to which respondents belong. For the National Readership Survey, a Social Grade scale adapted to the current situation in Romania has been used, which classifies social status in a form that is as close as possible to the ESOMAR standard.
The social grade scale has 8 categories, namely: category A (the highest), B, C1, C2, D, E1, E2, E3 (the lowest).
These 8 classification categories represent the optimal solution for achieving a balance between the following objectives:

•    correctly obtaining sub-groups on a given market;
•    grouping levels of education and occupation in a rational and meaningful way;
•    achieving homogeneity within each category on the basis of the scores for economic status;
•    carrying out multi-national comparative analyses.
 

Determining the social grade categories for SNA.
Social grade is a composite variable, built starting from:
 

•    the occupation of the person with the highest income in the household;
•    the level of education of the person with the highest income in the household;
•   where the person with the highest income in the household is inactive, the economic status of the household is used (determined according to the number of durable goods owned in the household, from a selected set of 10).

More precisely, if the person with the highest income in the household is active (that is, currently performs any kind of paid work), "social grade" is determined according to occupation and level of education, and if the person is inactive, "social grade" is determined according to their level of education and the economic status of the household.
All the members of a household are necessarily placed on the same step of the scale. In other words, social grade is a characteristic of the household, relevant for all its members. This means that the analysis of other socio-demographic characteristics (level of education, occupational status, etc.) of the persons interviewed is complementary to social grade, and not replaced by it.
The level of education of the main income earner in the family was determined by the last school completed. This measure of the level of education was used because of the discontinuous nature of formal education, especially before 1989.
 

n1 - no school completed, primary school
n2 - lower secondary school
n3 - first stage of high school
n4 - vocational school
n5 - high school
n6 - post-secondary school, college
n7 - higher education institution

The set of durable goods used is the following: fridge-freezer, microwave oven, air conditioning unit, dishwasher, electric kitchen mixer, central heating unit, two or more cars, computer (desktop, laptop, other type), holiday home, automatic washing machine.

The occupational categories taken into account are the following:

The methodology for classifying social grade
If the main income earner is an active person, classification into one of the 8 social grade categories is made according to the following matrix (the Social Grade Matrix):

	Occupation of the main income earner
Level of education		e1+2	e3+5	e4,6+7	e12	e8+9	e11+14	e15
	n7	A	A	B	B	C1	C1	D
	n5+6	A	B	C1	C1	C2	C2	D
	n3+4	B	C1	C2	D	D	D	E1
	n2	C1	D	D	E1	E1	E1	E3
	n1	D	D	D	E3	E2	E2	E3

If the main income earner in the household is inactive (e10, e13, e16), the scheme for classification into the social grade categories is the following:

	Economic status of the household (number of durable goods)
Level of education		5+	4	3	2	1	0/NA
	n7	A	A	B	C1	C1	D
	n5+6	A	B	B	C2	C2	D
	n3+4	B	C1	C1	E1	E1	E2
	n2	C1	C2	C2	E1	E2	E3
	n1	D	D	D	E2	E3	E3

In view of the above, the general meaning of the 8 social grade categories is the following (it being specified that the names are conventional, since those categories also apply to inactive persons):
Category A
"Senior managers and highly educated professionals"
  -  directors (general and deputy), managers, officers and heads of departments who have 6 or more employees under their supervision (they may also be owners of the company) and who have higher education;
  -  liberal professions (with higher education);
  -  salaried professionals, specialists and other staff with higher education.
 

Category B
"Middle-level managers and directors"
  -  directors (general and deputy), managers, officers and heads of departments who have 5 or fewer employees under their supervision and who are well educated;
  -  salaried professionals without higher education;
  -  farmers with higher education;
  -  business owners / craftsmen who have 6 or more employees and who have higher education.
Category C1
"Highly educated employees doing non-manual work, owners of small businesses"
  -  business owners / craftsmen who have 6 or more employees and who have completed high school;
  -  business owners / craftsmen who have 5 or fewer employees and who have higher education;
  -  directors (general and deputy), managers, officers and heads of departments who have 5 or fewer employees under their supervision and who have completed at most high school;
  -  employees doing non-manual work who have higher education;
  -  employees doing manual work who are skilled or have workers under their supervision and who have higher education;
  -  farmers who have completed high school.
Category C2
"Employees doing non-manual work or skilled workers"
  -  business owners / craftsmen who have 5 or fewer employees and who have completed high school;
  -  employees doing non-manual work who have completed high school;
  -  employees doing manual work who are skilled or have workers under their supervision and who have completed high school.
Category D
"Manual workers and less educated heads of departments"
  -  employees doing non-manual work who are less educated;
  -  employees doing manual work who are less educated;
  -  less educated business owners / craftsmen;
  -  less educated directors (general and deputy), managers, officers and heads of departments;
  -  farmers who are less educated.
Category E
"Manual and non-manual workers with a low level of education, owners of small businesses and farmers"
- E1
  -  team leaders and skilled workers with a low level of education
  -  unskilled workers with a medium level of education;
  -  non-manual workers not doing office work and owners of small businesses with a low level of education.
- E2
  -  team leaders and skilled workers with a very low level of education
  -  owners of small businesses with a very low level of education;
  -  non-manual workers not doing office work with a very low level of education.
- E3
  -  unskilled workers and farmers with a low level of education
Where a more synthetic classification is needed, or where the samples are small, these 8 categories can be aggregated into three broad classes, namely:
  -  category AB (upper): "managers, directors and professionals, specialists"
  -  category C (middle): "skilled workers, employees doing non-manual work"
  -  category DE (lower): "employees doing unskilled manual work and other categories of employees with a low level of education"

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The readership results are available in the specialised application Sesame, in the form of a database that the user can exploit according to their own objectives.
SNA provides information on the average issue readership of print press titles, on their socio-demographic profile, and on their description at the level of each publication studied or at the level of categories of publications that can be grouped by the user according to their own needs.
The software also makes available results on the consumption of products and services (including the brands consumed) and on lifestyle; all the information collected in the questionnaires can be consulted and studied both through simple descriptive analyses and through advanced statistical analysis techniques.
The types of analysis available in Sesame are:
 

1.    Exploring markets and publications:
 

•    Simple tables – presenting the values/percentages of any indicator or variable, in relation to the sample or the universe studied.
•    Cross-tabs – cross-tabulating two or more variables.
•    Market Monitor – comparing two or more brands in terms of consumer penetration and loyalty.
•    Market Descriptor – analysing target groups according to the indicators chosen by the user.
•    Principal component analysis – makes it possible to carry out segmentation analyses by creating homogeneous groups according to the indicators chosen by the user.
•    Correspondence analysis – a method for describing and visualising the relationships between two categorical variables.  
•    Trend analysis – makes it possible to observe how consumer preferences for a given brand, publication or variable studied evolve over time.
 

2.    Media plans:
 

•    The media plan – building, evaluating and optimising a media plan. The optimisation criteria may relate to the cost of the media plan or to the penetration and contact frequency it achieves.
•    Duplication – finding the number of readers shared by two publications.
•    Accumulation – the way in which a publication builds its audience over 1, 2 or more advertising insertions.
•    Media Monitor – comparing two or more publications in terms of the penetration and loyalty of their readers.

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Verification of compliance with the measurement standards and methodological conditions

BRAT's role is to continuously monitor compliance with the measurement standards and methodological conditions by the research institutes carrying out the fieldwork for the National Readership Survey. BRAT's checks cover compliance with the sampling method, with the schedule for the number of questionnaires per town and per day and with the CAPI interviewing procedures, as well as the correct training of the field interviewers, in accordance with the manuals and instructions specific to the study.

BRAT pays particular attention to the consistency and comparability of the data collected by each individual institute, so that the final sample is homogeneous and representative of the entire universe of the study, regardless of the institute that conducted the interview.

Where deviations from the established methodology are identified, BRAT may issue warnings to the research institutes involved and may request corrective measures, and in repeated or serious cases this may lead to a reassessment of the cooperation with the institute concerned.

The monitoring and checks carried out by BRAT ensure the application of a common standard for measuring print press readership on the Romanian market, regardless of the research institute that collected the data.