​London, Oct 16 (IANS) Individuals who prefer to watch "bad" or "trashy" movies, typically known as the low-budget films, are smarter, a study has found.

"Trash films" were described as cheaply or poorly made films that feature embarrassing or disturbing content. These low-budget films do not correspond to the mainstream standards and taste.

The study explored how trash films' characteristics support positive use of the label, the researchers said.

The study focuses on how something can be identified as cheap and worthless "trash" and still be embraced and (re)evaluated as providing positive enjoyment, Keyvan Sarkhosh, Film scholar at the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics in Frankfurt, Germany, was quoted as saying to natureworldnews.com.

The findings showed that people tend to watch such trashy films because they provide humour as well as entertainment.

On the other hand, the same group was also found to appreciate art films.

The enjoyment of watching trash films was found related to an ironic viewing stance.

Viewers attribute to trash films with not just amusing/entertaining qualities, but also a positive, transgressive deviance from the cinematic mainstream, and their appreciation of these films is coupled with marked preferences for art cinema, Sarkhosh said.

For the study, Sarkhosh conducted an online survey and included 372 participants -- composed of university students and people whose online presence on Facebook and on trashy film-related forums are felt.

The study showed that an 84 per cent of the fans of trash films had university degrees, which means they were primarily well-educated and were described as "omnivorous" audience.

"Such viewers are interested in a broad spectrum of art and media across the traditional boundaries of high and popular culture," Sarkhosh noted.

The study was published in journal Poetics.