Study Finds Anti-Drug Ads Ineffective

A Business School study commissioned by Boston Mayor Raymond L. Flynn's Policy Office concluded last week that anti-drug campaigns featuring celebrities have little effect on the youth group they target.

A B-School professor and five second-year students in a creative marketing class received $7000 from the city to work on the 100-page report, said Assistant Professor of Business Administration Kasturi V. Rangan, who advised the students.

The study found that typical celebrity advertisements of the kind the city has in the past sponsored do not reach the youth they target.

"[Youth] don't fall for spokesperson ads. Theydon't believe anything that celebrities say,"Rangan said.

"We found the kids to be pretty sophisticatedwhen it came to advertising," said Paul R.Crnkovich '82, one of the students who conductedthe study.

For anti-drug messages to have impact, "adultshave to stop telling kids what to do. The onlything that is going to work is to listen to thekids and do what they say," Crnkovich said.

The mayor's office proposed the study last fallto research marketing strategies that might workfor the city's anti-drug message.

"The idea came out of the mayor's campaign todeter the entry of crack from taking hold in theBoston area," said Neil Sullivan, director themayor's Public Policy Office.

The goal of the study was to determine "how dowe take market share away from the dealers?" saidKennedy School student Mark D. Zegan, a mayoralassistant who served as liaison between City Halland the B-School.

Rangan said this is the first time he knows ofthat B-School affiliates have conducted researchfor organizations other than corporations. "As faras I am concerned, this is the firstnot-for-profit project that we have undertaken atthe Business School," he said.

"The study itself and the project and theconclusions are pretty routine," Rangan said. "Wewere using our management research skills to lookat a social issue, which I think is terrific."

According to the report, drugs are marketed soeffectively on the streets that over two-thirds ofhigh school seniors in the United States, andalmost three-quarters of those in Massachusettshave tried illegal substances.

The B-School group distributed about 200screening questionnaires among the Bostoncommunity school system, and paid respondents a $3incentive fee, Rangan said.

The forms asked questions about street violenceand drug use, priorities among school, jobs andpleasure, and also asked how many hours oftelevision the respondent watched daily, theB-School students said.

About 100 Boston-area subjects, who wereguaranteed anonymity, attended 11 "focus" meetingsto discuss ways of reaching drug users throughadvertising, Rangan said. He added that those whoattended the meeting received $15 compensation.

The subjects who attended the meetings weredivided by age into three categories, 10-12, 14-18and 20-30, said one of the students who conductedthe study.

"We felt that the different age groups wouldgive us very different reads on awareness andexposure to drugs," Crnkovich said