Ryan Foree
Dr. Karlin
WRIT 150
22 September 2014
Under the Microscope:
The Causes and Consequences of Popular Publicized Health Issues Driving along the highway, billboards and posters plague the side of the road catching the eye of every passerby. These health campaign signs make the reader want to finally complete his or her application to join 24 Hour Fitness, to go and get vaccinated for HPV, or to pick up a credit card and donate to an “important” cause. Whether being a piece of paper on a bulletin board or a five-minute news segment on CNN, these forms of media are the catalyst of actions of participation and many others. However, the majority of people do not stop to think why these advertisements are so effective and why they feel
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Breast Cancer topped the list netting over 257 million dollars, while affecting 41,000 people. However Heart disease was ranked first for the amount of deaths, yet only received around 50 million dollars in funds (Bushak). In relation to health advertisements, popularity defines the level of awareness and amount of media coverage a particular health issue is receiving. It can also affect the amount of funding received, as shown in the study. Importance denotes the severity of the disease, and how many patients it affects. Importance is rather straight forward, while the reason why something is popular is a little more complex.
When trying to promote awareness for a health issue, campaigners attempt to make their cause popular by appealing to the values that society is drawn to. Campaign designers are fully aware that an important, deadly, highly contagious disease, could possibly receive little to no media coverage. It is all about strategic campaigning; how an issue is portrayed and what values they appeal to. For example, examine the issues of childhood obesity, which affects 17% of all children in America, and oral health disease, the most common infectious disease in the world ("Childhood Overweight and Obesity"). Both conditions have elements of
Often pictures can convey a stronger and more appealing message than a speech. With this in mind, the Centers for Disease Control advertising campaign promoted the importance of getting flu shots effectively through their visual media advertisements. Visual media can be evaluated through many factors. For instance, this type of media uses certain techniques to appeal to their audience: association, bandwagon, universal appeal, and flattery. The Centers for Disease Control's flue vaccine advertising campaign uses many appealing persuasive techniques to convey that getting vaccinated is beneficial.
Advertising is a complicated form of marketing, it’s almost like an art form. One must be acutely aware of their audience and what captures their attention, otherwise the advertisement will fall flat. There is a myriad of different ways to lure consumers into buying a product; for example, the Center for Disease Control’s (CDC) managed through a series of advertisements to convince individuals of the importance in getting a vaccination for the influenza virus. It was applied using multiple techniques, namely the methods of universal appeal and association. These techniques helped the CDC to effectively promotes the flu vaccine and get their message across to a wide range of people.
Every day, companies present the people with advertisements everywhere they go. Advertisements have become very prevalent in today’s society nowadays focusing in on a negative connotation. Advertisement has become an effective way for producers to display their new products. In present day, they come in forms of billboards, flyers, e-mails, and even text messages. It is widely known that companies create advertisements to persuade people to buy specific products or goods; however, it is not widely known that advertisements can make a negative impact on today’s society. The companies manipulate people’s mind and emotions, swaying people by new promotions and therefore generating a strong desire to fit into the society, that causes them to make inessential expenditures. Advertisements pose a critical impact on the American culture.
Every minute of every day, millions of people are exposed to advertisements. They plague televisions, streets, radio waves, and all means of communication. These advertisements employ many methods of persuasion and their influence is irresistible. Just like prisoners in Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, we are told every day to invest our time and interest into the subject of these advertisements, and to accept the forms of reality they serve us. Whether it be a commercial for a must-have new car, to a spot featuring desirable fast food, or to magazines with photoshopped models; we are seduced to accept these false
The average United States Citizen views about 5000 advertisements a day (Johnson). Advertising is everywhere. Billboards on the way to work, ads on the internet, and paper products such as magazines or newspapers display a sale or a promotion of a good or service. Usually, the ad will give a brand or company name, and uses the product’s merits to draw the consumer closer. This has grown exponentially as advertisements in media in 1970 were estimated to be 500 a day, a ten percent increase in the last 48 years. (Johnson). This is due to the rise of technology, as the computer has become a household gadget within the new millenium. These advertisements are meant to give a synopsis of the product or service’s purpose, quality, and efficiency. If a consumer views 5000 advertisements in a single day and assuming the commercials do not repeat, 5000 goods or services are introduced. With more options to choose from in such little time, the consumer has a harder time differentiating the quality and perhaps necessity of the product. The marketers rely on the quick, impulsive decision making of consumers. With the misleading nature of many infomercials or radio broadcasts, the people of American society are bombarded with constant propaganda, thus making seemingly harmless promotions more potent to filling industries’ pockets and lessening the common population’s
When people see or hear advertisements, whether it be in a magazine or on television, many do not stop to consider or analyze the techniques that go into making the advertisement effective. For instance, the Center for Disease Control has a campaign that has the purpose of promoting the influenza vaccination. If you examine the campaign closely, it becomes clear that the advertising campaign targets a diverse audience of all ages, genders, and races who could all benefit from getting an influenza vaccination. In this advertisement campaign, the Center for Disease Control effectively promotes the benefits of getting an influenza vaccination to a targeted audience using numerous persuasive techniques such as association and universal appeal.
The CDC's ad campaign promoting influenza vaccinations has a widespread appeal to many audiences due to its use of several proven persuasive techniques. Through the use of association, flattery, and universal appeal, as well as a variety of strategies, the ad campaign is highly convincing and is able to reach many audiences.
Having a health fair would help push the message out. In another study, the effects of messages describing consequences of childhood obesity was collected from two nationally representative internet based surveys (Gollust, Niederdeppe, & Barry,
Do we want basic cereal or the fancy kind that athletes promote, or can we live with a plain shirt or do we want the one with a guy riding a horse emblem? These want that stray away from our basic needs are all driven by advertisement. No one is born wanting a Gucci shirt, they are taught and conditioned to want one. The Frontline documentary, “The Persuaders”, delves into the world of advertisement in order to explore different aspects of the industry that drives our desire.
This documentary touched on so many accurate points in today’s society. Ads encourage unhealthy attitudes such as eating disorders. The obsession
This essay inspects the segments of a communication campaign intended for the activity of the prevention of childhood obesity. It investigates techniques to achieve an intended interest group with a specific end goal to actualize change and support the activity proposed by the Center for Disease Control (CDC).
I think that obesity is America’s biggest health problem because so many other health problems are contributed and linked to obesity.
Theories in psychology can be clearly seen in this campaign. The theories of social learning and exchange respectively also explain the effectiveness. The social exchange theory states that rewards and costs determine choice. Ben and Jerry's ice cream used the reward of free samples to influence choice. This theory can also be seen in another light. Audiences proceed but supporting this cause was rewarding and not costing to them socially. By saying that there were many people supporting the cause, people according to this theory or more likely to support the cause? The theory of social learning also play support in this campaign is well. The social learning theory states that people can predict the outcome of behavior by looking at how others learn. Audiences can make choices based on others' experiences. The media serves as a way of learning through observation. People can learn how to react to people, ideas, and social norms by watching a late-night television talk shows, a situation company, or a news hour talk show. This is exactly what happened with Ben & Jerry's ice cream. After partnering with freedomtomarry.com to encourage supporters to sign a petition, the campaign gain recognition from such talk shows and newsroom. These are the same newsrooms and talk shows that people use for identity confirmation, social learning, and socializing as is described in the text about the Uses and Gratification Theory. Viewers
We have become a generation where we rely on certain aspects to help promote an advertisement. This can range from racism, feminism, sexism, ageism and even possibly religion, homophobia; the list can go on and on. This may concern very few people or many people; they may find it offensive or disturbing.
In fact, “from 1997 to 2007, these procedures, overall, rose 457% to almost 12 million per year and an increase of 114% in actual surgeries, such as breast implants and liposuction”(Hodgson), all as a result of the influence of the advertising environment. Yet despite these statistics, many people feel exempt from the influence of advertising, this is because “only 8% of an ad’s message is received by the conscious mind, the rest is worked and reworked deep within the recesses of the brain”(Kilbourne). This working and reworking of the ad’s subliminal message of the brain is exponentially increased by the amount of ad’s the average American is exposed to every day. On average, Americans are exposed to over three thousand advertisements per day and will have been spent two years of their lives watching advertisements on the Internet and television by the time they die. This two hundred and fifty billion dollar per year industry that we call advertising profits from the appeasement of its consumers but at the cost of the consumers mental state. The cost of this environment, however, goes much further than just the environment itself, and extends rather into the direct objectification and dehumanization of women.