Find the predictors or the independent variables, and the dependent variable in that news story. Interpret any picture or graph included. Do you believe the conclusion to be true or not? Why? Is there anything you find to be interesting? If you are asked to redo the study, what shall you do?
I chose the story "A Look At The Effectiveness Of Anti Drug Ad Campaigns". In this segment, Ari Shapiro and Keith Humphreys discuss the public health emergency that is the opioid crisis. The independent variable here is the advertising campaign that Trump plans to put into place, and the dependent variable is the rate of opioid usage in teens and young adults. The goal of the campaign is to "get to people before they start" (NPR, 2017) through advertising that promotes a drug-free lifestyle.
Shapiro and Humphreys compared the advertisements against substance abuse that we see today to those that were promoted in the 1980's and 1990's. In the past, PSAs of this variety tended to send a straightforward message that drugs are bad, and that adults and authority figures want children to avoid drugs as they grow up. Humphreys pointed out that this type of language was actually correlated with an increase in marijuana use by teens and young adults.
In these ad campaigns, advertisers were trying to appeal to Congress, trying to appeal to, as Humphreys put it, "a 60-year-old white man or woman in a suit". Young adults are known, however, for wanting to rebel against authority and make their own decisions. As the problem became worse, Congress noted this, and shifted their anti-drug PSAs to a different tone. The new ads promoted the idea that youth should be rebelling against the influences in their life that would lead them towards substance abuse. By saying no to drugs, youth began to hear that they were proving they could make their own choices and rebelling against unhealthy influences.
In the end, Humphreys pointed out that the most effective method of substance abuse prevention is providing kids with a community and things to do. With social ties, activities they find fulfilling, and something to keep them busy, even high-risk children are much less likely to turn to substance abuse as they get older and more likely to focus on activities that will provide a reward in the long term rather than the short term reward and long term damage caused by drugs.
According to ProjectKnow, the government spent $31 billion on drug control from 2009 to 2012, including prevention programs, advertising, addiction recovery, incarceration, and law enforcement. The same article mentions the fact that much of the goevernment's drug funding in the past has gone towards studies on the dangers of marijuana, but that the public's attitude has changed over time, rendering any efforts on marijuana a failure. Additionally, many of these studies have shown that the drug is not dangerous should proper controls such as taxation be put into place, however these results have not been acted upon at the federal level (ProjectKnow, n.d.)
I find it particularly interesting how Humphreys chose to highlight the fact that drug prevention advertising campaigns may not be the most effective way to prevent drug use. Finding and promoting alternatives to drug use without bringing information on specific drugs into the equation certainly seems like it would be the most effective method to prevent youth from getting involved in illicit drugs. I think that the information Humphreys presents would be more interesting and applicable if he went further into detail on which types of alternative activities see the highest success rates, and which age groups respond best to alternative activities vs. advertising campaigns. By analyzing these factors, we would learn exactly where government funding should be going in order to most effectively fight the use of the most dangerous drugs.
Works Cited:
1. A Look At The Effectiveness of Anti Drug Ad Campaigns. NPR. 1 November 2017. Accessed 3 April 2018. https://www.npr.org/2017/11/01/561427918/a-look-at-the-effectiveness-anti-drug-ad-campaigns
2. How Much Money is Spent on Anti-Drug Campaigns in America? ProjectKnow. n.d. Accessed 3 April 2018. https://www.projectknow.com/how-much-money-is-spent-on-anti-drug-campaigns-in-america/
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