Show Your Real Face: A Fan Study of the UK Big Brother transmissions (2000, 2001, 2002). Investigating the boundaries between notions of consumers and producers of factual television

This audience research was designed to interrogate the UK fans of Big Brother so as to present evidence that might shed light on the audience's understanding of the 'reality' in this form of reality television. Using quantitative and qualitative data obtained from a web-based questionnaire linked to Big Brother's UK web site over three years, I investigate how the fan audiences negotiate what I have called 'personalised reality contracts' with the contributors, and how this affects their understanding of what they are seeing as 'real' or 'constructed'. I argue that it is Big Brother's constructedness that serves to liberate its content, allowing the viewer freedom to navigate past the performative elements typical of the docu-soap genre. I outline how this form of multi-platform TV creatively involves viewers on a number of levels, allowing them to develop strategies for watching that satisfy the desire to witness 'the real' through the lens of the camera. This is set within the context of the larger debate surrounding the change in status of factual programming