This article presents an empirically-based typology of television viewers in six European countries: Belgium, France, Great Britain, Italy, Luxembourg and West Germany. As part of the Eurobarometer 15 of spring 1981, surveys provided information on the television programme interests and viewing behaviours of representative sample members in those countries. Factor and cluster analyses produced five to six cross-nationally similar types of viewers per country, who differed significantly in the amount of time they spent viewing, as well as in sociodemographic, psychological and political characteristics. The results are discussed in the context of the literatures of both media uses and gratifications and the heavy-viewer syndrome, as well as in relation to current developments in European television provision.
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