• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, April 21, 2006

Television is a more potent ad medium than any of its media brethren, claims a Nielsen survey conducted for the Television Bureau of Advertising.

The research revealed that 82 percent of Americans say television advertising is the most influential, a far higher number than newspapers (7 percent), radio (5 percent), the Internet (4 percent), or magazines (4 percent).

Nielsen conducted the survey of nearly 1,200 adults over a three-week period in January. The research was commissioned by the TVB, which released the favorable findings Thursday at its annual marketing conference in New York.

The research also asked people which advertising medium is "the most authoritative" and found that 51 percent cited television, compared with 24 percent for newspapers, 11 percent for magazines, 10 percent for radio, and 5 percent for the Internet.

Broadcast television also performed well in respondents' opinions of its news content. The survey showed more adults turn to broadcast television as their primary news source (44 percent) than cable news (24 percent), newspapers (11 percent), and the Internet and radio (both 9 percent).

The medium also topped the survey as adults' first source for local weather, traffic, or sports (56 percent), outperforming the Internet (13 percent) and radio (11 percent), with newspapers down the list at 7 percent.