1. Age of Acquisition (or people meters) small devices attached to television sets to keep track of what programs are being watched 2. channel surfing estimates on how many people, and what kinds of people, are watching a television program at a given time 3. Nielsen Media Research the false belief that a person is always "this way" or "that way." 4. representative sample (or Nielsen) the company that measures TV ratings 5. set meters time periods where Nielsen intensively collects data from consumers on what they are watching 6. stereotypes an accounting of what someone watches on television; this is one way that television ratings are tabulated 7. sweeps week a group of people who share the same characteristics of the population 8. television diary switching from one station to another quickly, usually with a remote control 9. television ratings consumers ages eighteen to thirty-four. This group is most desired by advertisers (see the public relations lesson)