When we first discussed a special issue on pharmaceuticals, marketing and society, we were focused on translating familiar research topics into this critical industry. In those now distant 2019 “before times,” we looked forward to reading papers related to all aspects of the marketing mix, regulation and practice - hopefully providing insights that were both broad in reach and specific in application

This article offers marketing and public policy researchers and professionals a peek into pharmaceutical marketing from the practitioner’s perspective. Through an interview process with eight active pharmaceutical marketing managers and medical doctors, the authors highlight some of the most pressing challenges facing pharmaceutical marketing practitioners today. Three key themes are identified, including

While many drugs are used exclusively for medical reasons, and others are used solely for recreational enjoyment, some drugs are commonly used for both purposes. For example, cannabis, opioids, and stimulants are unique in many ways, but they share the fact that they are regularly consumed both medicinally and recreationally (Dinnin Huff, Humphreys, and Wilner 2021; Drazdowski 2016). However, it is

At the midpoint of our JPP&M editorship, we reflect on the journey we have shared with the marketing and public policy (MPP) community. We continue to face challenging times together, as scholars and as individuals. Since the beginning of our tenure in 2020, the world has become increasingly volatile and uncertain. The global COVID-19 pandemic continues to affect the lives of every individual, community

This paper contributes to disinformation research by showing how identity-driven controversies are prime vehicles for circulating disinformation. We theorize disinformation as an engagement-driving process that encourages participation in culture wars through any argumentative means—including not only falsehoods but also truths, half-truths, and value-laden judgments—exploiting them rhetorically to

Combating harmful misinformation about pharmaceuticals spread through social media is a growing challenge. The complexity of health information, the role of expert intermediaries in disseminating information, and the information dynamics of social media create an environment where harmful misinformation spreads rapidly. However, little is known about the origin of this misinformation. This paper explores

Direct-to-consumer television advertisements (DTCA) for pharmaceutical medications must include a major statement disclosing the drug’s most important risks and side effects. However, advertisers often pair incongruent positive visual imagery with risk information presented auditorily. Incongruence violates a principle of effective communication because it distracts from information processing. Across

Public policy is a growing area in marketing and an area where quantitative or analytical models can make important contributions (Martin and Scott 2021). This discipline aims to increase impact by conducting responsible research and addressing important policy questions, yet we see few examples of such papers (as reviewed in this article). In the words of Scott et al. (2022), ‘the arc of scholarly

In this paper, the authors apply institutional theory to explain physician acceptance of pharmaceutical marketing payments and the mechanisms by which the behavior may be influenced by social groups. Using a large panel of over three million physician-year observations, the authors provide evidence that peer and organization norms, captured by the prevalence of peers and organizational members accepting

This study presents selective moral disengagement (Bandura 1986, 2002, 2015) as a paradigm for analyzing extremist marketing messages and for developing effective counter-messages. Selective moral disengagement explicates eight mechanisms common to extremist media content that can influence seemingly ordinary people to support and commit atrocities. Through a qualitative content analysis, the author

The Journal of Public Policy and Marketing has long welcomed scientific inquiry at the intersection of public policy and consumer behavior. While the existence of this intersection feels like a given, defining the contours and borders of this intersection is arguably much grayer. It is not uncommon for readers and authors new to JPP&M to puzzle over whether their consumer research is policy-oriented

One of the most significant recent changes in the WIC Program is that the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 mandated the conversion of the program to an electronic benefit transfer (EBT) system by October 1, 2020. This mandate has led to some technical challenges and policy issues. Focusing on the adoption of a generic price look-up (PLU) code, an important EBT mechanism intended to facilitate

Nonprofit organizations addressing societal challenges such as hunger, poverty, and racial inequities seek to grow the impact of their promising solutions to these problems—scaling social impact. Yet, local, community-based nonprofits often struggle to identify a path to scale their impact. To address this problem, we partnered with eleven nonprofits engaged in social impact scaling. By integrating

Persuasion knowledge development helps consumers cope with marketplace persuasion, leads to better consumer decision making, and adds to consumer well-being. While significant research exists on the impact that individual factors (e.g., age) and cues (e.g., sponsorship disclosure messages) have on consumers’ persuasion knowledge development, little is known about the influence of marketer actions,

Rituals, particularly religious rituals, may play a significant role in times of crises. Often, these rituals undergo revision in order to adapt to the changing needs of the time. In this paper, we investigate recent unofficially revised Hindu religious rituals as performed during the COVID-19 pandemic. The multifarious creative interplay between Hindu tradition and change is illustrated through four

Research on food and food waste has been receiving growing attention, and public policy plays an important role in the food marketing system. Although marketing and public policy appears to focus largely on food rather than food waste, concern about the latter is growing due to its environmental and economic impact. Drawing on the accompanying articles, this commentary illuminates three important facets

As the Journal of Public Policy & Marketing (JPP&M) celebrates 40 years, we look to the future through the lens of our strategic plan: based on the principles of impact, rigor, and relevance through inclusivity (Martin and Scott 2021). Inspired by Martin Luther King Jr.’s (1968) observation that “the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice,” we believe that, as marketing and

The adoption of front-of-package (FoP) nutrition labels to promote healthier food choices is increasing worldwide, yet it remains unclear which types of nutrition labels are superior from a public policy perspective. This research compares two common forms of evaluative FoP nutrition labels that vary in the number of colors and corresponding letters they display (three colors, A—C [3C] vs. five colors

For 40 years, the Journal of Public Policy & Marketing (JPP&M) has provided a forum within the marketing discipline for scholarship on the impact of public policies and actions on marketers, consumers, and society. It seeks articles that offer insightful and thoughtful analyses of public policies that affect the marketing profession and the marketplace. Martin and Scott’s (2021, p. 2) editorial stresses

Poor women can face stigmas about indolence, moral turpitude, and substance abuse. This stigmatized condition includes female sex workers, who live and work in situations that exacerbate impoverishment and bring societal exclusion and shame. We situate our arguments at the nexus of poverty and stigma and examine the value of identity formation and reformation in the context of female sex workers in

For several decades, the Journal of Public Policy & Marketing has stimulated and led debates with far-reaching implications for consumer well-being, global relationships and, ultimately, human survival. The challenges we face have not disappeared but intensified. Today, we must respond to climate change, manage a global pandemic, and address disparities and inequities that threaten our planet in ways

The purpose of this special issue is to encourage the emerging role of analytics in marketing and public policy research. We draw attention to a multitude of comprehensive data sources and analytical techniques that tackle important public policy and marketing issues. We highlight six key domains that provide fruitful avenues for such pursuit: retail analytics, social media analytics, marketing mix

In this JPPM article for the 40th Anniversary of the Journal of Public Policy … Marketing, the authors first share what is meant by “policy,” “public policy,” and “marketing and public policy” for researchers in our field. The authors then offer examples of JPPM research informing policy across different stages of the policy making process: problem identification, agenda setting, policy formulation

The present research investigates how charitable giving in response to threat-based awe, an emotional experience that typically accompanies disaster-relief campaigns, is likely to depend on consumers' implicit theories. While consumers want to behave prosocially when experiencing threat-based awe, due to the presence of threats, such behavior depends upon whether they believe that their donations have

Many public-policy studies (Martin and Scott 2020) use randomized field experiments for drawing causal conclusions (e.g., Chen et al. 2020). A typical randomized field experiment involves a control group and a treatment group to which individual units (e.g., consumers, patients) are randomly assigned, after which an intervention is implemented in the treatment group. An intervention could be a marketing

The Journal of Public Policy & Marketing (JPP&M) published its first issue in 1982, and over the course of the next year we are celebrating 40 years of scholarship in its pages. Under the stewardship of founding editor Thomas C. Kinnear and the bold visions of the editors who followed, the Journal has featured change-making research that tackles some of society’s most pressing issues and questions

Research on marketing in society has become increasingly prevalent, as evident in many subgroups such as public policy and marketing (PPM), macromarketing, consumer economics, social marketing, marketing ethics, international consumer policy, Transformative Consumer Research (TCR), and the Subsistence Marketplaces Initiative (Wilkie and Moore 2012). PPM and TCR represent significant communities, with

The Journal of Public Policy & Marketing (JPP&M or the Journal hereinafter) was founded by Tom Kinnear of the University of Michigan in 1982 with the publication of its predecessor, Journal of Marketing & Public Policy. After the American Marketing Association (AMA) raised some concern about potential confusion with the Journal of Marketing, the Journal bore its current name from 1983 onward. The 1982

Although hundreds of millions of people consume news every day, the marketing discipline has paid little attention to this realm of consumption and its relevance for consumer behavior, marketing management, public policy, and societal well-being. This commentary identifies news media as a pressing and meaningful area for research at the intersection of marketing, society, and public policy. Exploring

Both regulatory agencies and nonprofit organizations seek to understand how different tactics and appeals contained in food and public health advertisements might influence the food intake of an increasingly dieting-concerned population. This article addresses this important issue by examining how consumers who are concerned with their diets react to rich images of unhealthy food consumption. Results

Diet carbonated soft drinks were introduced to help consumers lower caloric intake. However, critics suggest that these drinks can provide an excuse to consume more calories, a so-called “Big Mac and Diet Coke” mentality that is consistent with behavioral theories such as moral licensing (e.g., combining a healthy eating choice with an indulgent, less healthy one). Using individual-level food and drink

The increase in global temperatures requires substantial reductions in the greenhouse emissions from consumer choices. We use an experimental incentive-compatible online supermarket to analyse the effect of a carbon-based choice architecture, which presents commodities to customers in high, medium and low carbon footprint groups, in reducing the carbon footprints of grocery baskets. We relate this

It has been an honor and inspiration to serve as coeditors for this special issue of the Journal of Public Policy & Marketing (JPP&M) on Transformative Consumer Research (TCR). In this editorial, we aim to provide some background on the TCR movement and position it within a broader emerging theme that envisions “Marketing as a Force for Good” in a more sustainable world. To operationalize this vision

Food waste is a global sustainability issue that demands several stakeholders to participate in solving it. This article examines how different food system stakeholders are held responsible in the policy debate related to food waste reduction. The study adopts a framing approach, paying attention to the construction and negotiation of what is going on in the food waste related public policy debate

Communities are increasingly confronted with disasters that bring acute and chronic challenges. Past research highlights the importance of ad hoc marketing exchange systems for expanding community resource capacities following a disaster. The current study builds on this research taking a granular look at an existing ad hoc marketing system that provided exchange services before a disaster. Prior to

This paper highlights some benefits to and issues with the application of big data and analytics, with emphasis on its role in health care. It considers both its effectiveness/value (i.e., how it can be used) and concerns about its use related to privacy and acceptance by individuals (i.e., how it should be used)

Researchers are increasingly confronting the need to examine the impacts of social media on democratic discourse. Analyzing 55,560 tweets from the official Twitter accounts of the Democratic and Republican parties in the United States, we examine approaches used by political parties to encourage sharing of their content within the contemporary political divide. We show that tweets sent by the Republican

The internet raises substantial challenges for policy makers in regulating gambling harm. The proliferation of gambling advertising on Twitter is one such challenge. However, the sheer scale renders it extremely hard to investigate using conventional techniques. In this paper the authors present three UK Twitter gambling advertising studies using both Big Data analytics and manual content analysis

Using data gathered through data scraping techniques from a variety of previously disjointed sources—some proprietary and some publicly available—our work applies the analytical techniques of data visualization and machine learning to (1) gain exploratory insights into the drivers of prescription drug list prices and to (2) test how well these variables directly impact and interact to predict pricing

Political polarization is a marked political division in the population, characterized by multiple manifestations. We argue that it can impact consumer psychology, which in turn influences marketers, policy makers, and consumer welfare. The present work introduces the construct of political polarization to the marketing literature, and shows how it serves as a novel challenge for various marketing

Within an institutional theory framework, this paper identifies three interconnected fields of the marketing institution – research, education, and practice – that contribute to advancing the diversity and inclusion discourse in promoting multicultural marketplace wellbeing. Conducting three studies, one in each field and across contexts in three continents, we identify barriers that inhibit effective

This article demonstrates symbiotic academic-social enterprise (SASE), a bottom-up approach intertwined with the subsistence marketplace research stream. The SASE approach is unique in coevolving academic and social initiatives in parallel for the express purpose of achieving dual objectives: societally relevant research and social impact over an extended period. Distinct from typical action research

Medicare uses a pay-for-performance program to reimburse hospitals. One of the key input measures in the performance formula is patient satisfaction with their hospital care. Physicians and hospitals, however, have raised concerns especially about questions related to patient satisfaction with pain management during hospitalization. They report feeling pressured to prescribe opioids to alleviate pain

This study examines the long-term efficacy of the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) 2003 Red Flag Initiative, which aimed to curb the prevalence of deceptive claims in over-the-counter (OTC) weight loss product advertising. The principal component of this effort was the FTC’s promotion of voluntary guidelines which encouraged media outlets to screen advertisements for the seven deceptive (“Red Flag”)

Environmental disruptions, such as extreme weather events or poisoning of natural resources, are increasing in frequency and intensity. These critical global problems demand market- and policy-based solutions. Adopting a transformative consumer research perspective, this article examines the effects of environmental disruptions on the livelihoods of a very vulnerable group: nature dependent prosumers

Contemporary consumers, societies, and ecologies face many challenges to well-being. Consumer researchers have responded with new attention to what engenders happiness and flourishing, particularly as a function of consuming more wisely. Consumer wisdom has been conceptualized as the pursuit of well-being through the application of six interrelated dimensions: Responsibility, Purpose, Flexibility,

Race is integral to the functioning and ideological underpinnings of marketplace actions yet remains undertheorized in marketing. To understand and transform the insidious ways in which race operat...

In this editorial update, we provide perspective regarding what has transpired since these commentaries were written and published online in July 2020 (Scott et al. 2020). We remain in the midst of a pandemic that has rapidly and catastrophically spread worldwide. Indeed, as the COVID-19 pandemic rages on, it has underscored social inequalities and divides affecting the world. Though not comprehensive

The overconsumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) is associated with non-communicable diseases such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and cancer. While voluntary industry codes have largely failed ...

Ultra-processed food manufacturers have proposed that product reformulation should be a key strategy to tackle obesity. In determining the impact of reformulation on population dietary behaviours, ...

The critical role of marketing in driving nonprofit performance has been recognized for decades. However, in practice, there has been a disturbingly weak acknowledgment and/or implementation of mar...

The global refugee crisis is a complex humanitarian problem. Service researchers can assist in solving this crisis because refugees are immersed in complex human service systems. Drawing on marketi...

Mutual fund advertisers often highlight their funds’ past returns albeit with an SEC mandated disclosure. To ascertain whether the SEC disclosure is effective and how it could be improved, the authors conduct seven experiments of individuals’ choices of mutual funds with ads touting past success plus disclosures. These experiments lead to several findings: First, current SEC disclosures do not work

Consumer-generated online reviews of credence service providers, such as doctors, have become common on platforms such as Yelp and RateMDs. Yet doctors have challenged the legitimacy of these platforms on the grounds that consumers do not have the expertise required to evaluate the quality of the medical care they receive. This challenge is supported by the economics of information literature, which

Millions of women entrepreneurs in subsistence contexts face consumption constraints while embedded in strongly patriarchal social institutions. In these contexts, the place for women is believed t...

In general, Americans are not savers, which contributes to their inability to absorb even small financial shocks and increases their potential for financial hardship. Savings automation has been pr...

I started The CMO Survey in 2008 with the mission to collect and disseminate the opinions of top marketers in order to predict the future of markets, track marketing excellence, and improve the value of marketing in firms and in society. Since February 2018, I have been tracking marketing leaders’ response to the following question: “Do you believe it is appropriate for your brand to take a stance

The global political system is undergoing profound transformations. Political spending is reaching unprecedented heights (particularly in the United States), and much of it is shifting to social media and other nontraditional forms. The way that citizens engage the political system is also changing. For example, in 2020, the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer sparked protests and

As incoming editors, we created a leadership structure that was a first for JPP&M: three coeditors serving as equals. We had several primary goals for the journal during our tenure. One was to engage a broader group of scholars who were dedicated to marketing and public policy issues. We welcomed Kelly Martin, Rebecca Reczek, Maura Scott, Cliff Shultz, Lisa Bolton, Marlys Mason, Beth Vallen, and Melissa