MUMBAI: Viewers of kids’ television have shown a shift in their character preference, from the start of 2010 till now.

As per the latest Ormax Media’s Small Wonders study conducted in October, Doraemon and Chhota Bheem now rank as the No 1 and No 2 favourite television characters among the 6-14-year-olds across seven cities in India.

Interestingly, Jerry, who was the most favourite character in the last track conducted earlier this year, has lost a 49 per cent share to be displaced to the third position. Doraemon and Chhota Bheem have both seen a 40 per cent growth in their individual shares. 
 
Among kids whose preferred channels were GECs (instead of kids channels), the top three favourite characters were Inspector Daya (CID), Daya (Tarak Mehta Ka Oolta Chashma) and Anandi (Balika Vadhu).

Small Wonders, a six-monthly kids’ study conducted by media research and consulting firm Ormax Media, is a syndicated study that ranks kids’ favourite characters on television, along with reasons for the same.

The study is conducted among kids in seven cities – Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Lucknow and Jalandhar. Around 2000 kids across SECs ABC are interviewed in every track.

Ormax Media claims that findings from Small Wonders can be used by channels as programming and communication inputs for their own characters. “The study also gives an overall understanding of the types of characters that are working, with reasons, thus giving an insight into the evolving traits and trends over a period of time,” the company said.

The subscribers of the report get the overall ranking of all characters, with reasons for preference, market and TG differences.