Advertising Campaigns, Prosocial

Prosocial advertising campaigns use advertising aimed at a particular audience, for a specified period of time, with the aim of achieving a specified goal that is beneficial to society. For example, the national Anti-Drug Campaign mandated by Congress runs ads aimed at teens to prevent drug use. Campaigns may be sponsored by government agencies, nonprofit organizations, commercial enterprises, or coalitions of different groups. Some well-funded campaigns pay for the advertising placements and therefore have more control over when the ads are run. Many campaigns, however, rely on donated time, and the ads run as public service announcements at the discretion of the media organization.

Prosocial advertising is often combined with other organized communication activities as part of a comprehensive communication and social marketing campaign. Campaigns often have greater success when advertising is used in conjunction with other mass media formats (such as news, soap operas, and testimonial programs). Infomercials often, although not always, rely on testimonials—endorsements by real people. Health messages also sometimes use testimonials to make a point. Prosocial campaigns may also use other communication strategies (e.g., using promotional materials such as caps and mugs, sponsoring contests or events, offering professional counseling or workshops in small groups, enhancing communication within communities, and advocating to change policies and alter environments to be more conducive to the desired behavior). For example, a nutrition campaign may advertise healthy foods and also advocate for the reduction of vending machines with unhealthy foods in schools.

Prosocial ad campaigns aimed at large populations of children and adolescents can affect large numbers of young people, although the percentage of the population affected is typically less than 10%. Campaigns promoting a new behavior are more effective than campaigns aiming to prevent or eliminate a negative behavior, and behaviors that can be performed once or a few times are easier to promote than behaviors that need to be repeated often. Youth substance abuse campaigns seem to have about the same effects as substance abuse interventions in schools. Alcohol use reduction and smoking prevention campaigns have a greater impact than campaigns designed to reduce or prevent illegal drug use.

Several theories are used to design better campaigns. Analysis based on developmental, behavior change, and communication theories can help to do several things: (1) identify the persuasive strategy to be used in the campaign (such as whether to emphasize certain pieces of information, risks and other motivational factors, peer norms, types of behaviors, and behavioral skills); (2) select the media and other channels to use in the campaign and determine the timing and frequency of communication; and (3) design the messages. Theory can also guide the selection of young people to target, using criteria such as current behaviors, actual and perceived risk, age at which risky behaviors begin, current knowledge and beliefs, and communication patterns. Theories that are commonly applied to campaigns include the theory of planned behavior, the information-motivation-behavioral skills model, social cognitive theory, information processing theory, and the health belief model.

It is important to carefully define the target audience(s) for the campaign, including their developmental level, to design effective messages and select the most appropriate media and other channels. For example, campaigns aimed at Mexican American teens can be designed to be sensitive to cultural beliefs and communication patterns, abilities, and preferences. Sometimes, campaigns that strive to impact youth also target parents or other people influential in children's lives in order to encourage them to perform a particular behavior on behalf of their children (e.g., bringing children to a clinic or a doctor for immunizations or to reinforce ads directed at kids (e.g., campaigns to increase bike helmet usage have asked coaches to talk to their teams).

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