Does Anyone Really Know What Time It Is: '30' The New '24'

by Mitch Oscar, Mar 30, 2010, 1:45 PM

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An "Alice in Wonderland" excerpt:

"Alice sighed wearily. 'I think you might do something better with the time,' she said, 'than wasting it in asking riddles that have no answers.'

'If you knew Time as well as I do,' said the Hatter, 'you wouldn't talk about wasting it.'

'I don't know what you mean,' said Alice.

'Of course, you don't!' the Hatter said, tossing his head contemptuously. 'I dare say you never even spoke to Time!'

'Perhaps not,' Alice cautiously replied; 'but I know that I have to beat time when I learn music.'

'Ah, that accounts for it,' said the Hatter. 'He won't stand beating. Now if you only kept on good terms with him, he'd do almost anything you liked with the clock.'"

Taking the Mad Hatter's advice, I didn't ask Alice about time. I asked Bruce Friend, president of OTX, the global consumer insights and research consulting firm that was recently acquired by Ipsos, whom I invited to present the latest update of their Longitudinal Media eXperience, whose first of four waves launched in spring 2008, at the MPG Collaborative Alliance in March.

According to the behavioral, attitudinal, aspirational OTX LMX Study: "The 24 hour day has consistently given way to 30 hours of daily activity, as consumers multi-task everywhere (home, work, on the go) at any time, while diverting their attentions across multiple media platforms to communicate, gather information and be entertained."

Most of the trades I've read suggested that people are sleeping less - compensating for more demands on their time. OTX did not concur. Their study indicated that people continue to average 8 (and change) hours of sleep per day regardless of the length of that day i.e., 30 hours vs. 24 hours.

The chart below delineates the number of daily hours expended in OTX's three category multitasking day:

 

Category	24 hour Day
Wave	-	Wave 1	Wave 2	Wave 3	Wave 4
Time Period	Spring 2008	Spring '08	Fall '08	Spring '09	Fall '09
Sleeping	8.1	8.1	8.3	8.5	8.4
Leisure/Media Consumption Activities*	7.6	12.3	12.8	12.9	12.5
Non Leisure Activities	8.2	10.0	9.0	8.6	8.7
Total	23.9	30.4	30.1	30.0	29.6

 

*Include television, video games, online usage, print (books, magazines, newspapers) and music as well as eating, socializing, sports/working out, toys, shopping, telephony and movies.

As illustrated above, the greatest changes occur (in real time), as one would surmise, in the Leisure Activity category where multitasking proclivities abound - roughly 5 hours daily, which is nearly 65% of the extended 30 hour day.

To paraphrase Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit":

"One [media activity] makes time larger
And [multitasking activities] makes time small
And the media activities that mother gives you
Don't do anything at all.
Go ask Alice
When she's ten feet tall
Call [OTX]
To find out which [multitasking activities] make time just so small."

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0 comments on "Does Anyone Really Know What Time It Is: '30' The New '24'".

1. Paula Lynn from Who Else Unlimited
   

   commented on: March 30, 2010 at 2:08 p.m.

   As usual, people tend to over estimate what they do. So if the survey was based on what people thought the amount of time they spent on each activity, then the outcome is probably skewed. One other thing to mention. From what I have read from various sources written by way smarter folk than I, people can only do one thing at a time. Some can switch from one task faster than another - task and individual - , but still one at a time. I would like to be Alice, though. ("to whom I invited, by whom I invited, with whom I invited, preposition whom I invited" or who (subject) I invited" ? - quoth the Mad Hatter.)

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