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January 20, 2005updated 22 Nov 2022 1:57pm

It’s official: work, love and drink fuel media

By Press Gazette

A new survey into the lifestyles of media staff shows that they live
up to their stereotype of being hard working, hard loving and hard
drinking.

The survey of press and broadcast journalists,
advertising staff and PRs, was conducted for Mediabuddies.com, the
media staff reunion and networking club on the internet, by market
research firm VAR International.

It reveals that 83 per cent of respondents rated themselves hard working, 38 per cent hard loving and 25 per cent hard drinking.

Nearly
a quarter, 24 per cent, confessed to having had an affair with an
office colleague, 20 per cent met their partner at work and 29 per cent
knew someone who was having an affair at work.

On privacy, 26 per
cent of the respondents working in TV & radio and the press said
they were not upset at all by intruding into other people’s private
lives and were just doing their job; 23 per cent said they were upset,
but needed to do the job and 21 per cent said they would be upset and
avoided such work.

More than three-quarters (79 per cent) said
they believed in what they wrote and promoted, but agreed some
compromise was necessary.

According to the survey, the top benefits of working in the media was being creative, job satisfaction and making a difference.

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But
a quarter of respondents said they would have chosen another career if
they had their lives over again, with the law, sport, acting and
medicine topping the list of preferred jobs.

Only 2 per cent said
they would want their children to follow them into a media career. Most
(74 per cent) would leave it to their children to decide.

David
Davis, the founder of Mediabuddies, said: “The most surprising factor
of the study was the candid way the media was prepared to answer
questions about their private lives and feelings when normally they
would be asking such difficult and sensitive questions of others.”

A
total of 256 Mediabuddies – 53 per cent men, 47 per cent women – living
in the US, the UK and 29 other countries took part in the study.

Email pged@pressgazette.co.uk to point out mistakes, provide story tips or send in a letter for publication on our "Letters Page" blog

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