“Drinking Won't Get You Thinking”: A Content Analysis of Adolescent-Created Print Alcohol Counter-advertisements

Abstract

Involvement in creating antialcohol advertisements generates enthusiasm among adolescents; however, little is known about the messages adolescents develop for these activities. In this article, we present a content analysis of 72 print alcohol counteradvertisements created by high school (age 14–17 years old) and college (18–25 years old) students. The posters were content analyzed for poster message content, persuasion strategies, and production components, and we compared high school and college student posters. All of the posters used a slogan to highlight the main point/message of the ad and counterarguments/consequences to support the slogans. The most frequently depicted consequences were negative consequences of alcohol use, followed by negative–positive consequence comparison. Persuasion strategies were sparingly used in advertisements and included having fun/one of the gang, humor/unexpected, glamour/sex appeal, and endorsement. Finally, posters displayed a number of production techniques including depicting people, clear setting, multiple colors, different font sizes, and object placement. College and high school student-constructed posters were similar on many features (e.g., posters displayed similar frequency of utilization of slogans, negative consequences, and positive–negative consequence comparisons), but were different on the use of positive consequences of not using alcohol and before–after comparisons. Implications for teaching media literacy and involving adolescents and youth in developing alcohol prevention messages are discussed.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This publication was supported by grant R21 DA027146 from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to Rutgers University (grant recipient), Kathryn Greene, principal investigator. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.