SPUR Project

2011 winner (14 of 20)

An investigation into the effectiveness of media campaigns for raising public health awareness

Supervisors: Dr Linda Gibson (Criminology, Public Health and Policy Studies) and Dr Matthew Ashton (Politics and Sociology)

Students: Rani Laurd and Karen Haughton

Recent approaches in health promotion campaigns have extensively used social marketing techniques and there is now a current move within the political arena to draw on ‘nudge theory’ to persuade people to make the ‘right’ choices. The project looked at the effectiveness of public health campaigns in terms of capturing the attention of the public amid competition from other media sources and motivating people to change health behaviours or to create new healthier habits. The project also explored the role of actors such as the State, the corporate sector, the community and the University in driving health campaigns. The students assisted with research design, gathered data from a wide range of sources including the internet and assisted with data analysis and report writing.