• by Wayne Friedman , February 25, 2010

NBC's Vancouver Winter Olympics is getting more older viewers, on average, than other audience groups. At the same time, the games are also following similar comparisons versus other non-sports prime-time programming.

As with most prime-time programming, the Olympics continue to have a mostly female profile: 56% of its viewers are women and 44% of its viewers are men.

Nielsen says this is almost the direct opposite of the Super Bowl audience -- where 54% are men and 46% are women.

Nielsen says ratings for the Olympics are indexing the highest among older viewers -- 82% more than the total viewership average of the Olympics. By comparison, this year's Super Bowl's viewer 55 plus group was 15% higher than its total viewership average rating.

Among the key advertiser 18-49 group, ratings are 20% lower than the event's overall viewership average. Teenage viewers are 57% lower. By contrast, the Super Bowl delivers 6% more 18-49 viewers and 20% fewer 12-17 viewers than its average.

The study also says Hispanic and African-American Olympic ratings are each 74% below average, with Asian-American viewership 15% below average. Regionally, viewership is highest in the West and Central region -- 24% above average -- and the Southwest is 28% below average.

Good news for those with better home technology. Fifty-five percent of homes watching the Winter Olympics have HDTV sets. Viewership among HDTV homes is 14% higher than the national average. In DVR households, ratings are 12% higher.