The Apprentice

04/07/08

Posted by Karen

The Apprentice is providing some top quality water-cooler moment fodder at the moment. When chatting about it last week it became apparent that the increasingly Big Brother-like feel to the current series is turning some people off. The viewers concerned feel that the Apprentice has become firmly embedded within the reality TV genre and is now ‘beneath’ them. It is brain numbing trash TV, they feel, and not worthy of their time. To provide the necessary shock and drama, it promotes a discourse about business that they despise, all back stabbing and aggressive tactics. This, along with a recent survey finding that people think reality TV is one of the worst ideas ever (on a par with the atomic bomb and capital punishment) got me eager to find out more.

As a diligent researcher, I went in search of more evidence to test this phenomenon and gained new insights. It seems that we researchers feel able to retain the moral high ground as Apprentice viewers, despite its dubious slippage into trashy territory. We are not watching merely to be entertained, oh no, but as skilled observers, analysts of group dynamics. Our water-cooler discussions do not resort to slagging off the candidates breathtaking lack of common sense, but centre on intelligent, evidence based insights about human behaviour. At least most of the time…