ITV quizzes vs channel 4/bbc

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Why do ITV quizzes tend to assume the audience are stupid & have stupid contestants on them?

For eg when I watch Lingo I get it not 'right every time' but right after a short period of time or at least not as wrong as the contestants.

The contestants will be told 'this word ladder will fill in any letter which you say which is right' so for eg if it's 'putrid' and the person guesses 'putting' the first 3 letters will be filled in. But they don't seem to understand this basic hangman idea & keep on guessing words it would've filled in letters from

Compare that to for eg Countdown. Countdown contestants don't always guess the absolute best word but they are reasonably intelligent. Sometimes I beat them, sometimes I don't. Maths isn't my strong suit so I get very happy when I get one of their maths puzzles right.

Or for eg take a trivia quiz.

Something like the chase would have a question like:
'what colours is the French flag?
A Red white and blue, B Gold yellow and pink, C Black red and Gold' and contestants would get it wrong.

Compare that to the level of hard that for eg Mastermind or University Challenge questions are at. And contestants get them right about the same amount.

The other thing is: prizes. Seems like the stupider the quiz is, the better the prizes are. Mastermind offers an 'award', Countdown offers a dictionary, ITV quizzes offer loads of money.

If it wasn't for the sensory issues related to going on such shows, I would go on an ITV quiz because I would be deemed a 'genius' on such a show. Don't get be wrong - I'm just a regular person, not an actual genius but it's all comparative.

Hmm, interesting. I actually analyse Chase data - someone sends me the ages and genders, chaser, cash builders, offer choices if any, out/through, and final chase stats (contestant score, seconds left or chaser score after 2 min) and this person say that the Chase is actually quite hard. It varies depending on the contestant, I think. Sometimes the questions are hard and sometimes they are easier. Have you ever seen a chase episode? If so, what made you come to that conclusion?

I'm not sure which other ones I've seen outside of Lingo, I think it was Tipping Point.

Chase has the best reputation out of all the ITV quizzes in terms of genuine difficulty.

If contestants were street smart, Who Wants to Be A Millionaire would be easy. Because they could just do it to whatever hundred they got stuck at then take the money.

What I'd like to know is:
1 Could you bring something which was genuinely hard for most people rather than middling/easy to the channel? Channel 4 manages this whilst being commercially viable.
2 Shouldn't that kind of achievement be more rewarded? Viewers at home want to be impressed by contestants doing what we can't. Viewers at home want to be genuinely happy/excited when we get things right rather than 'used to it'.

One thing I find difficult to understand is - why so many multiple choices? Where they could just guess the answer?

The biggest, most challenging quiz I ever saw was BBC's Only Connect. That one has my dad able to do it but I can't - at least not a full one.

I'm afraid I haven't heard of Lingo before. Could you possibly explain the format and why you believe most people playing to be stupid?
I see what you mean about a hard quiz. I guess the Chase counts as hard - a lot of people, sometimes very good people, fail. But then that's a whole range from doesn't know much to knows a lot. I think stupidity is less common than on other shows - there are some great instances of common sense kicking in.