Survey finds binge TV viewers feel no shame

The majority of people who watch television online say they regularly indulge in binge-watching, and they feel no shame about it, according to a survey by Netflix.

Market research firm Harris Interactive quizzed 1,500 US adults who stream TV shows online at least once a week about their viewing habits, and the results confirmed a trend toward watching multiple episodes of a given show in one sitting. The survey was sponsored by on-demand streaming service Netflix.

Sixty-one percent said they regularly indulged in binge viewing, which nearly three in four respondents defined as watching two to six episodes at a time.

Seventy-three percent said they had positive feelings about binge viewing, and 51 percent said they prefer doing so with other people.

"The couch potato has awoken," cultural anthropologist Grant McCracken said in a statement.

"Binge watching has really taken off due to a perfect storm of better TV, our current economic climate and the digital explosion of the last few years."

Netflix delighted binge viewers in February, when it dropped all 13 episodes of the first season of its Emmy-nominated political drama "House of Cards" in one fell swoop.

Rivals took the cue, with Amazon.com inaugurating its foray into original programming, the comedy "Alpha House" starring John Goodman, with the simultaneous release of its first three episodes on its video streaming service.

© 2013 AFP