Movie theaters in developing economies should consider the big screen

Study finds smaller movie screens, more show times boost ticket sales, but not in all markets

2015-08-10

(Press-News.org) In emerging economies, where real estate is expensive and space is limited, there has been a boom in multiplex movie theater construction fueled by the conviction that small screens with many show times will increase ticket sales. But new research from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business finds that the strategy doesn't always work. In the paper Quality vs. Variety: Trading Larger Screens for More Shows in the Era of Digital Cinema by Chicago Booth Assistant Professor of Marketing Anita Rao and Stanford University Professor Wesley R. Hartmann, researchers find that movie house owners could benefit from considering the demographics of local audiences. They ask the question: Do local moviegoers prefer the quality of the big screen or the convenience of a variety of show times? And the answer is - it depends on where you live. The study, published in Quantitative Marketing Economics, finds that overall, adding one more show time has a greater impact on boosting ticket sales than increasing screen size. But, when researchers broke down the data by demographics, they discovered urban markets with a large percentage of highly educated consumers showed a preference for wider screens while other regions favored a greater variety of show times. The researchers conducted the study in the densely populated cities of India where recent economic growth has led to a boom in cinema construction, particularly of multiplexes showing the same film on several small screens. They collected data from 14 markets and seven theater chains across India, examining consumer choices made for about 600 film screenings over the course of 44 weeks. Digital technology reduces the costs of additional screenings for a given movie because a digital copy of a movie can run on multiple screens at the same time, the study said. While additional shows are generally worth the screen-size tradeoffs, theater owners need to be aware of the exceptions to maximize ticket sales. "The study has implications for theater chain owners expanding into international markets," said Rao. Using demographic data to isolate which markets prefer the quality of a bigger screen to the convenience of more show times can help marketers attract more customers and sell more tickets.

INFORMATION:

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Drug candidate kills cancer cells through overstimulation

2015-08-10

A drug candidate that overstimulates proteins crucial for tumor growth shows promise as a new strategy to treat a wide range of cancers. The demands of rapid cell division put a strain on cancer cells, and the approach works by tipping cell stress over the edge. In the August 10 issue of Cancer Cell, American researchers show that the drug candidate inhibits tumor growth in a mouse model of breast cancer and efficiently kills a broad range of human cancer cells. "No prior drug has been previously developed or proposed that actually stimulates an oncogene to promote therapy," ...

Link between hunger and health care costs

2015-08-10

Low-income people who struggle to put food on the table also use the health care system more, which means higher health care costs, according to new research published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). "We know that people who have trouble affording the food they need have poorer health in general as well as more chronic disease," states Dr. Valerie Tarasuk, Department of Nutritional Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario. The term "food insecurity" describes inadequate or insecure access to food because of financial constraints. In Canada in ...

As California wildfires burn, southern plant species are shifting northward

2015-08-10

As California wildfires burn tree canopies and the forest floors they support, the plants that are replacing the understory are increasingly those found in more southern areas of the West, according to a study from the University of California, Davis. "The plants we're finding underneath our forests are becoming more like those seen in Mexico and Southern California," said lead author Jens Stevens, a postdoctoral scholar with the UC Davis John Muir Institute of the Environment. "Under climate change, we're seeing species from drier, warmer areas increasingly taking over. ...

Education intervention with residents improves understanding of transgender issues

2015-08-10

BOSTON-The term "transgender" has made its way into mainstream media thanks to Caitlyn Jenner, previously known as Bruce Jenner, who came out as a transgender woman earlier this year. But for many physicians, or physicians-in-training, who do not typically treat transgender patients for issues specific to their gender identity, it's still a mystery. Joshua Safer, MD, FACP, endocrinologist at Boston Medical Center and associate professor of medicine and molecular medicine at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM), and his colleague Dylan Thomas, MD, conducted an ...

Seniors at high risk for readmission after ambulatory surgery

2015-08-10

Taking four pain pills an hour instead of four pills a day Need improved, understandable discharge instructions More than 9 million ambulatory surgeries performed annually on seniors CHICAGO --- Patients 65 and older who have ambulatory surgery are much more likely to be readmitted to the hospital within 30 days than younger patients, regardless of their health before surgery, reports a new, large national Northwestern Medicine study. The likely cause, based on previous research, is difficulty understanding medication dosing and discharge instructions, as well ...

Life is but a DREAM

2015-08-10

Results of a 2013 DREAM Challenge - a crowdsourcing initiative for systems biomedicine - have been published in Nature Biotechnology; Hundreds of scientists from around the world pooled their efforts to test how accurately they could predict the effect of toxic compounds in different individuals, or across a population; Combined results achieved a rough estimate of population effects, and methods emerged that may be able to provide real-world benefit in the hazard assessments of new compounds. 10 August 2015 - An international study published in Nature Biotechnology ...

Severe droughts could lead to widespread losses of butterflies by 2050

2015-08-10

Widespread drought-sensitive butterfly population extinctions could occur in the UK as early as 2050 according to a new study published today in the scientific journal Nature Climate Change. However, the authors conclude that substantial greenhouse gas emission reductions combined with better management of landscapes, in particular reducing habitat fragmentation, will greatly improve the chances of drought-sensitive butterflies flying until at least 2100. The study was led by Dr Tom Oliver from the UK's Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (CEH) in collaboration with colleagues ...

Mass. General-led team identifies first gene that causes mitral valve prolapse

2015-08-10

An international research collaboration led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators has identified the first gene in which mutations cause the common form of mitral valve prolapse (MVP), a heart valve disorder that affects almost 2.5 percent of the population. In a paper receiving advance online publication in Nature, the research team reports finding mutations in a gene called DCHS1 in affected members of three families in which MVP is inherited. "This work provides insights into the pathways regulating valve growth and development and implicates a previously ...

New computational method predicts genes likely to be causal in disease

2015-08-10

A new computational method developed by scientists from the University of Chicago improves the detection of genes that are likely to be causal for complex diseases and biological traits. The method, PrediXcan, estimates gene expression levels across the whole genome - a better measure of biological action than single mutations - and integrates it with genome-wide association study (GWAS) data. PrediXcan has the potential to identify gene targets for therapeutic applications faster and with greater accuracy than traditional methods. It is described online in Nature Genetics ...

Package of articles, podcast focus on end-of-life, physician-assisted suicide

2015-08-10

JAMA Internal Medicine will publish a package of articles, along with an author interview podcast, focused on end-of-life, euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide. The original investigation, research letter, special communication and commentaries are detailed below. In the first article, Marianne C. Snijdewind, M.A., of the VU University Medical Center, Amsterdam, and coauthors1 looked at outcomes of requests for euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide received by a clinic founded in 2012 to provide the option of euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide for patients ...

One of the largest studies on preterm birth finds a maternal biomarker test significantly reduces neonatal morbidities and improves neonatal outcomes

One of the largest studies of its kind finds early intervention with iron delivered intravenously during pregnancy is a safe and effective treatment for anemia

New Case Western Reserve University study identifies key protein’s role in psoriasis

First-ever ethics checklist for portable MRI brain researchers

[Press-News.org] Movie theaters in developing economies should consider the big screen
Study finds smaller movie screens, more show times boost ticket sales, but not in all markets

Movie theaters in developing economies should consider the big screen

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: