Aliterate Consumers’ Processing of Drug Risk Information inDirect-to-Consumer Pharmaceutical Advertising

Abstract

This research investigates how aliterate consumers process drug risk information. An experimental approach and 398 participants were employed to assess the effects of manipulating drug risk presentation format. When drug risk information is presented in paragraph form, highly consumer aliterate individuals display lower levels of drug risk comprehension and different levels of perceived drug risk than their less-consumer aliterate peers. Providing the same information in a bullet format attenuated consumer aliteracy driven differences in comprehension and eliminated differences in perceived drug risk. These results hold important ethical implications regarding how risk information is disclosed in direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical advertising.

Keywords:

• Direct to consumer advertising
• pharmaceutical
• consumer aliteracy
• drug risk
• ethics and pharmaceutical advertising

Notes

1 Although consumer aliteracy is a continuum, we employ the term “aliterate consumer” to refer to someone at the higher end of the continuum (i.e., someone less likely to read in a consumer context) and “less-aliterate consumer” or “lower-aliterate consumer” to refer to people at the lower end of the continuum.