Archive
Screening Sexy: Film Females and the Story that Isn’t Changing
Screening Sexy: Film Females and the Story that Isn’t Changing
Source: Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, University of Southern California
In the last five years, Hollywood has generated well-known and popular female-driven fare like Bridesmaids, The Hunger Games and the Twilight franchise. Given the success of these blockbusters, you might think that the number of roles for women is on the rise. Think again.
Across five years (2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2012), 500 top-grossing films at the U.S. box office, and over 21,000 speaking characters, a new study by USC Annenberg found that females represented less than one-third (28.4%) of all speaking characters in 2012 films. When they are on screen, 31% of women in 2012 were shown with at least some exposed skin, and 31.6% were depicted wearing sexually revealing clothing.
Even worse? “There has been no meaningful change in the prevalence of women on screen across the five years studied. In fact, 2012 features the lowest percentage of females in the five years covered in this report,” said Communication Professor Stacy L. Smith, the principal investigator. “The last few years have seen a wealth of great advocacy for more women on screen. Unfortunately, that investment has not yet paid off with an increase in female characters or a decrease in their hypersexualization.”
The authors also examined how the presentation of women varied by the age of the character. “The findings are as provocative as the outfits, especially when teenage female characters are considered,” Smith said.
Over half of female teen characters (56.6%) were shown in sexy attire in 2012, compared with 39.9% of women between the ages of 21 and 39. 2012 capped off a three-year increase in the hypersexualization of teen girls, while for other age groups the numbers do not show the same hike.
When a female works behind the camera in the key creative role of writer or director, there are more women shown on screen, and fewer female characters are hypersexualized.
Exploring the Barriers and Opportunities for Independent Women Filmmakers
Exploring the Barriers and Opportunities for Independent Women Filmmakers (PDF)
Source: Sundance Institute
In our digital age, ideas and culture are increasingly shaped by the stories told with moving images. This context elevates film artists to an enormously influential role in determining how we see ourselves, one another, and the world around us. Yet the vast majority of films made and seen in the United States are written, directed and produced by male filmmakers whose stories tend to reflect dominant themes and reinforce the status quo. What might the future look like for both men and women given the full inclusion of a generation or two of truly empowered female perspectives in our media ecology?
There is a growing body of empirical research that documents how having a woman at the helm can affect the types of stories being told. First, female directors are more likely to feature girls and women on screen than male directors. This is true in both top-grossing films 1 and crit – ically acclaimed projects nominated for Best Picture Academy Awards over a 30-year period. 2 It is often as true for women producers as it is for women directors. Second, female producers and directors affect not only the prevalence of girls and women on screen, they also impact the very nature of a story, or the way in which a story is told. Examining more than 900 motion pictures, one study found that violence, guns/weapons, and blood/gore were less likely to be depicted when women were directing or producing, and thought-provoking topics were more likely to appear.
These patterns are not restricted to cinema. A recent content analysis 4 of war stories filed for news outlets during the first 100 days of three different international conflicts (Bosnia, Persian Gulf, Afghanistan) showed that female correspondents were more likely than their male counterparts to focus news stories on the victims of war, abuses to human rights and soldier profiles. Women put a human face on conflict reporting, just as they do in film.Together, the evidence is quite clear: gender of the storyteller matters.
Currently, the presence of women behind the camera in popular film is infrequent at best. Assessing 250 of the top-grossing U.S. movies of 2011, 5 one study found that only 5% of directors, 14% of writers, and 25% of producers were female. These statistics have fluctuated very little since 1998. This picture would seem to suggest that the traditional Hollywood economic model or power-structure is a leading impediment to access for women filmmakers.
Copyright in the Digital Era: Building Evidence for Policy
Copyright in the Digital Era: Building Evidence for Policy
Source: National Research Council
Over the course of several decades, copyright protection has been expanded and extended through legislative changes occasioned by national and international developments. The content and technology industries affected by copyright and its exceptions, and in some cases balancing the two, have become increasingly important as sources of economic growth, relatively high-paying jobs, and exports. Since the expansion of digital technology in the mid-1990s, they have undergone a technological revolution that has disrupted long-established modes of creating, distributing, and using works ranging from literature and news to film and music to scientific publications and computer software.
In the United States and internationally, these disruptive changes have given rise to a strident debate over copyright’s proper scope and terms and means of its enforcement–a debate between those who believe the digital revolution is progressively undermining the copyright protection essential to encourage the funding, creation, and distribution of new works and those who believe that enhancements to copyright are inhibiting technological innovation and free expression.
Copyright in the Digital Era: Building Evidence for Policy examines a range of questions regarding copyright policy by using a variety of methods, such as case studies, international and sectoral comparisons, and experiments and surveys. This report is especially critical in light of digital age developments that may, for example, change the incentive calculus for various actors in the copyright system, impact the costs of voluntary copyright transactions, pose new enforcement challenges, and change the optimal balance between copyright protection and exceptions.
Only 15 Minutes? The Social Stratification of Fame in Printed Media
Only 15 Minutes? The Social Stratification of Fame in Printed Media
Source: American Sociological Review
Contemporary scholarship has conceptualized modern fame as an open system in which people continually move in and out of celebrity status. This model stands in stark contrast to the traditional notion in the sociology of stratification that depicts stable hierarchies sustained through classic forces such as social structure and cumulative advantage. We investigate the mobility of fame using a unique data source containing daily records of references to person names in a large corpus of English-language media sources. These data reveal that only at the bottom of the public attention hierarchy do names exhibit fast turnover; at upper tiers, stable coverage persists around a fixed level and rank for decades. Fame exhibits strong continuity even in entertainment, on television, and on blogs, where it has been thought to be most ephemeral. We conclude that once a person’s name is decoupled from the initial event that lent it momentary attention, self-reinforcing processes, career structures, and commemorative practices perpetuate fame.
Combat Camera Multi-service Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures For Combat Camera (COMCAM) Operations
Source: U.S. Department of Defense (via Federation of American Scientists)
This multi-Service Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures (MTTP) publication for combat camera (COMCAM) establishes TTP for commanders, planners, and staffs at all levels with a single source document and addresses essential information to plan, employ and integrate COMCAM capabilities.
Chapter I provides an overview of COMCAM operations and how COMCAM assets provide commanders a unique, firsthand visual account of tactical actions. It describes how COMCAM supports commanders by acquiring, processing, and disseminating classified and unclassified imagery and multi-media products collected during all phases of military operations or campaigns.
Chapter II describes each Services’ COMCAM capabilities, team make-up, and highlights specific attributes to assist the commander and planner during the force development process. This helps to facilitate the matching of mission specific requirements with the correct COMCAM capability.
Chapter III highlights COMCAM roles and responsibilities of Service components, the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense, Joint Combat Camera Program Manager, Imagery Operations and Coordination Center (IOCC) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). COMCAM units have specific roles and responsibilities assigned to them to ensure combatant commanders are provided with the joint COMCAM forces and assets.
Chapter IV describes how COMCAM forces are tasked, deployed, and employed as an integral part of operations to ensure visual information documentation of US military activities during wartime, worldwide crises, contingencies, joint exercises, and other events of significant national interest involving the Department of Defense.
Chapter V provides an overview of the Services’ COMCAM training. Integrating COMCAM assets into joint exercises is also addressed.
Appendix A provides key contact information and overviews the COMCAM tasking process. It notes that COMCAM requirements for joint operations must be vetted through the Global Force Management (GFM) process to the Service providers. Once the requirement is sourced to the respective Services, the details (personnel and logistics) will be loaded in the Joint Operation Planning and Execution System (JOPES) for assignment of unit line numbers (ULNs).
Appendix B provides operational examples of COMCAM imagery used to support Commanders objectives. The photos and vignettes provide the Commander with explicit examples of how COMCAM can support mission objectives.
The media and intellectuals’ response to medical publications: the anti-depressants’ case
The media and intellectuals’ response to medical publications: the anti-depressants’ case
Source: Annals of General Psychiatry
During the last decade, there was a debate concerning the true efficacy of anti-depressants. Several papers were published in scientific journals, but many articles were also published in the lay press and the internet both by medical scientists and academics from other disciplines or representatives of societies or initiatives. The current paper analyzes the articles authored by three representative opinion makers: one academic in medicine, one academic in philosophical studies, and a representative of an activists’ group against the use of anti-depressants. All three articles share similar gaps in knowledge and understanding of the scientific data and also are driven by an ‘existential-like’ ideology. In our opinion, these articles have misinterpreted the scientific data, and they as such may misinform or mislead the general public and policy makers, which could have a potential impact upon public health. It seems that this line of thought represents another aspect of the stigma attached to people suffering from mental illness.
The Effects of Music Therapy on Vital Signs, Feeding, and Sleep in Premature Infants
The Effects of Music Therapy on Vital Signs, Feeding, and Sleep in Premature Infants (PDF)
Source: Pediatrics
OBJECTIVES: Recorded music risks overstimulation in NICUs. The live elements of music such as rhythm, breath, and parent-preferred lullabies may affect physiologic function (eg, heart and respiratory rates, O2 saturation levels, and activity levels) and developmental function (eg, sleep, feeding behavior, and weight gain) in premature infants.
METHODS: A randomized clinical multisite trial of 272 premature infants aged ≥32 weeks with respiratory distress syndrome, clinical sepsis, and/or SGA (small for gestational age) served as their own controls in 11 NICUs. Infants received 3 interventions per week within a 2-week period, when data of physiologic and developmental domains were collected before, during, and after the interventions or no interventions and daily during a 2-week period.
RESULTS: Three live music interventions showed changes in heart rate interactive with time. Lower heart rates occurred during the lullaby (P < .001) and rhythm intervention (P = .04). Sucking behavior showed differences with rhythm sound interventions (P = .03). Entrained breath sounds rendered lower heart rates after the intervention (P = .04) and differences in sleep patterns (P < .001). Caloric intake (P = .01) and sucking behavior (P = .02) were higher with parent-preferred lullabies. Music decreased parental stress perception (P < .001).
CONCLUSIONS: The informed, intentional therapeutic use of live sound and parent-preferred lullabies applied by a certified music therapist can influence cardiac and respiratory function. Entrained with a premature infant’s observed vital signs, sound and lullaby may improve feeding behaviors and sucking patterns and may increase prolonged periods of quiet–alert states. Parent-preferred lullabies, sung live, can enhance bonding, thus decreasing the stress parents associate with premature infant care.
Gone in 60 Seconds: The Impact of the Megaupload Shutdown on Movie Sales
Gone in 60 Seconds: The Impact of the Megaupload Shutdown on Movie Sales
Source: Social Science Research Network
The growth of Internet-based piracy has led to a wide-ranging debate over how copyright policy should be enforced in the digital era. While some enforcement approaches involve policies designed to deter consumers from filesharing though incentives or penalties, other approaches target the supply of piracy by shutting down Internet sites that serve as major conduits for pirated content. In this paper we analyze how one such anti-piracy intervention, the shutdown of the popular Megaupload site, affected the digital sales of movies for two major studios.
Simply examining changes in sales after the shutdown would produce an inaccurate measure of its actual effect as sales are changing over time for a variety of reasons. Instead we exploit cross-country variation in pre-shutdown usage of Megaupload as a measure of treatment intensity. Controlling for country-specific trends and the Christmas holiday, we find no statistical relationship between Megaupload penetration and changes in digital sales prior to the shutdown. However, we find a statistically significant positive relationship between a country’s Megaupload penetration and its sales change after the shutdown, such that for each additional 1% pre-shutdown Megaupload penetration, the post-shutdown sales unit change was 2.5% to 3.8% higher, suggesting that these increases are a causal effect of the shutdown.
Aggregating these increases, our analysis across 12 countries suggests that, in the 18 weeks following the shutdown, digital revenues for these two studio’s movies were 6-10% higher than they would have been if not for the shutdown. Thus our findings show that the closing of a major online piracy site can increase digital media sales, and by extension we provide evidence that Internet movie piracy displaces digital film sales.
FTC Undercover Shopper Survey on Entertainment Ratings Enforcement Finds Compliance Highest Among Video Game Sellers and Movie Theaters
FTC Undercover Shopper Survey on Entertainment Ratings Enforcement Finds Compliance Highest Among Video Game Sellers and Movie Theaters
Source: Federal Trade Commission
A Federal Trade Commission undercover shopper survey found that video game retailers continue to enforce age-based ratings, while movie theaters have made marked improvement in box office enforcement.
Only 13 of underage shoppers were able to purchase M-rated video games, while a historic low of 24 percent were able to purchase tickets to R-rated movies. In addition, for the first time since the FTC began its mystery shop program in 2000, music CD retailers turned away more than half of the undercover shoppers. Movie DVD retailers also demonstrated steady improvement, permitting less than one-third of child shoppers to purchase R-rated DVDs and unrated DVDs of movies that had been rated R for theaters. (See Figure 1).
The State of the News Media 2013
The State of the News Media 2013
Source: Project for Excellence in Journalism
In 2012, a continued erosion of news reporting resources converged with growing opportunities for those in politics, government agencies, companies and others to take their messages directly to the public.
Signs of the shrinking reporting power are documented throughout this year’s report. Estimates for newspaper newsroom cutbacks in 2012 put the industry down 30% since its peak in 2000 and below 40,000 full-time professional employees for the first time since 1978. In local TV, our special content report reveals, sports, weather and traffic now account for 40% of the content produced on an average newscast while story lengths shrink. On CNN, the cable channel that has branded itself around deep reporting, produced story packages were cut nearly in half from 2007 to 2012. Across the three cable channels, coverage of live events during the day, which often require a crew and correspondent, fell 30% from 2007 to 2012 while interview segments, which tend to take fewer resources and can be scheduled in advance, were up 31%. Time magazine, the only major print news weekly left standing, cut roughly 5% of its staff in early 2013 as a part of broader company layoffs. And in African-American news media, the Chicago Defender has winnowed its editorial staff to just four while The Afro cut back the number of pages in its papers from 28-32 in 2008 to 16-20 in 2012. A growing list of media outlets, such as Forbes magazine, use technology by a company called Narrative Science to produce content by way of algorithm, no human reporting necessary. And some of the newer nonprofit entrants into the industry, such as the Chicago News Cooperative, have, after launching with much fanfare, shut their doors.
This adds up to a news industry that is more undermanned and unprepared to uncover stories, dig deep into emerging ones or to question information put into its hands. And findings from our new public opinion survey released in this report reveal that the public is taking notice. Nearly one-third of the respondents (31%) have deserted a news outlet because it no longer provides the news and information they had grown accustomed to.
At the same time, newsmakers and others with information they want to put into the public arena have become more adept at using digital technology and social media to do so on their own, without any filter by the traditional media. They are also seeing more success in getting their message into the traditional media narrative.
Challenges and Opportunities for Change in Food Marketing to Children and Youth: Workshop Summary
Challenges and Opportunities for Change in Food Marketing to Children and Youth: Workshop Summary
Source: Institute of Medicine
The childhood obesity epidemic is an urgent public health problem. The most recent data available show that nearly 19 percent of boys and about 15 percent of girls aged 2-19 are obese, and almost a third of U.S. children and adolescents are overweight or obese (Ogden et al., 2012). The obesity epidemic will continue to take a substantial toll on the health of Americans. In the midst of this epidemic, children are exposed to an enormous amount of commercial advertising and marketing for food. In 2009, children aged 2-11 saw an average of more than 10 television food ads per day (Powell et al., 2011). Children see and hear advertising and marketing messages for food through many other channels as well, including radio, movies, billboards, and print media. Most notably, many new digital media venues and vehicles for food marketing have emerged in recent years, including Internet-based advergames, couponing on cell phones, and marketing on social networks, and much of this advertising is invisible to parents.
The marketing of high-calorie, low-nutrient foods and beverages is linked to overweight and obesity. A major 2006 report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) documents evidence that television advertising influences the food and beverage preferences, requests, and short-term consumption of children aged 2-11 (IOM, 2006). Challenges and Opportunities for Change in Food Marketing to Children and Youth also documents a body of evidence showing an association of television advertising with the adiposity of children and adolescents aged 2-18. The report notes the prevailing pattern that food and beverage products marketed to children and youth are often high in calories, fat, sugar, and sodium; are of low nutritional value; and tend to be from food groups Americans are already overconsuming. Furthermore, marketing messages that promote nutrition, healthful foods, or physical activity are scarce (IOM, 2006). To review progress and explore opportunities for action on food and beverage marketing that targets children and youth, the IOM’s Standing Committee on Childhood Obesity Prevention held a workshop in Washington, DC, on November 5, 2012, titled "New Challenges and Opportunities in Food Marketing to Children and Youth."
The Media Economics and Cultural Politics Of Al Jazeera English in the United States
The Media Economics and Cultural Politics Of Al Jazeera English in the United States (PDF)
Source: University of Michigan (Youmans)
Before scholarship can consider the greater implications of AJE’s brand of reporting on world affairs, it is necessary to begin with a mapping of the actuality of AJE’s circulation – the focus of this thesis. This immediately generates a problem. The United States is the key market implied in these theoretical approaches given its centricity in international communication. Yet, AJE is not reachable by the vast majority of Americans’ remote controls. This necessarily dampens analysis of wider effects on power and inter-cultural conflict. Before considering impact, we must take an inventory of where and how AJE travels in the country – and why. There are distributional exceptions to its absence, including large centers, such as Washington, DC and parts of New York City, as well as limited cities such as Burlington, VT and Toledo, OH. While it is fully available online, an increasingly key avenue for American news viewership, Internet news consumption is still secondary to TV – one motivation for AJE’s active pursuit of cable deals in the largest majority English-speaking news market. For AJE, distribution in the United States has been a primary goal and source of frustration, despite its easy availability via the Internet. AJE sees cable in particular as the best way to reach, and therefore influence, a wide American audience – which is one of the most vital news markets in the world, given the country’s disproportionate role in world affairs. The primary question of interest is why has it failed to gain wide TV availability and therefore a large audience? A second question is, what does AJE’s absence mean for international communication, US-Arab relations and the channel itself? This study seeks to identify and examine the factors and constraints that keep AJE largely off of American televisions and relate these to the larger theoretical questions posited in AJE and global communication scholarship. Also, there are key junctures, such as the Arab Spring, which rejuvenated the network’s reputation in key quarters of American society. These moments illuminate further how the factors work in explaining AJE’s lack of distribution.
New From the GAO
New GAO Reports
Source: Government Accountability Office
Broadcast and Cable Television
Requirements for Identifying Sponsored Programming Should Be Clarified
GAO-13-237, Jan 31, 2013
Defense Logistics
A Completed Comprehensive Strategy is Needed to Guide DOD’s In-Transit Visibility Efforts
GAO-13-201, Feb 28, 2013
Department Of Justice
Executives’ Use of Aircraft for Nonmission Purposes
GAO-13-235, Feb 26, 2013
Homeland Defense
DOD’s Aerospace Control Alert Basing Decision Was Informed by Various Analyses
GAO-13-230R, Feb 28, 2013
Prescription Drugs
The Number, Role, and Ownership of Pharmacy Services Administrative Organizations
GAO-13-176, Jan 29, 2013
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families
Workforce Participation Requirement Waivers
GAO-13-423T, Feb 28, 2013
Twitter as a Reporting Tool for Breaking News
Twitter as a Reporting Tool for Breaking News
Source: Digital Journalism
This study focuses on journalists Paul Lewis (The Guardian) and Ravi Somaiya (The New York Times), the most frequently mentioned national and international journalists on Twitter during the 2011 UK summer riots. Both actively tweeted throughout the four-day riot period and this article highlights how they used Twitter as a reporting tool. It discusses a series of Twitter conventions in detail, including the use of links, the taking and sharing of images, the sharing of mainstream media content and the use of hashtags. The article offers an in-depth overview of methods for studying Twitter, reflecting critically on commonly used data collection strategies, offering possible alternatives as well as highlighting the possibilities for combining different methodological approaches. Finally, the article makes a series of suggestions for further research into the use of Twitter by professional journalists.
Hat tip: Journalist’s Resource
Field Guide to Fixed Layout for eBooks
Field Guide to Fixed Layout for eBooks
Source: Book Industry Study Group
In the fast moving world of digital content, one hot-button issue is the creation of static, fixed e-book "pages" called fixed layout. The popularity of fixed-layout e-books is growing, but many people are still unsure why and when fixed layout is a good idea. To make matters worse, there is no single standard for creating fixed-layout products and information on creating them is rapidly changing and sometimes hard to find.
To help address these challenges, the Book Industry Study Group (BISG), through its Content Structure Committee’s Fixed Layout for E-Books Working Group, has created a Field Guide to Fixed Layout for E-Books.
The Field Guide is intended to be a brief introduction to fixed layout, including when it’s the most appropriate format to use–and when it’s not. In addition, the Field Guide offers practical guidance on the basics of creating fixed-layout formats, current retailer standards for supporting fixed layout, and issues of accessibility to consider before creating content in fixed-layout format.
Mobile News Adoption among Young Adults: Examining the Roles of Perceptions, News Consumption, and Media Usage
Source: Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly
Using the frameworks of innovation diffusion and technology acceptance model, this study examines the predictors of mobile news consumption among young adults. The results show that the perceived relative advantage (especially content), utility, and ease of use of mobile news are positively related to its adoption. The young adults’ news consumption patterns and preferences, as well as media usage, all play a role in the adoption of mobile news. This study also validates the importance of examining the adoption outcome from multiple perspectives.
Hat tip: Journalist’s Resource
A review and model of journalism in an age of mobile media
A review and model of journalism in an age of mobile media
Source: Digital Journalism
The technological convergence of mobile “phones” and multimedia has been taking place since the 1990s, but it was not until the commercial birth of touchscreen-enabled mobile devices, offered with flat-rate subscriptions for mobile internet, that widespread production and use of news-related content and services began to flourish. Accessing mobile news has gained traction in the everyday life of the public. In parallel, legacy news media have in recent years developed news provision, by repurposing or customising journalistic content published for mobile sites and/or applications. This article explores the production of mobile news, by discussing and synthesising the findings of the contemporary literature found in the nexus of journalism and mobile media. It posits a model of journalism focusing on the roles of humans and technology in activities characterised by customising or repurposing. The article also presents a research agenda focusing on the production of mobile news.
Hat tip: Journalist’s Resource
What the Public Knows – In Pictures, Maps, Graphs and Symbols
What the Public Knows – In Pictures, Maps, Graphs and Symbols
Source: Pew Research Center for the People & the Press
The latest update of the Pew Research Center’s regular News IQ quiz uses a set of 13 pictures, maps, graphs and symbols to test knowledge of current affairs. (To take the quiz yourself before reading this report, click here.) At the high end, nearly nine-in-ten Americans (87%) are able to select the Star of David as the symbol of Judaism from a group of pictures of religious symbols. And when shown a picture of Twitter’s corporate logo, 79% correctly associate the logo with that company.
At the low end, just 43% are able to identify a picture of Elizabeth Warren’s from a group of four photographs of female politicians, among them Nancy Pelosi, Tammy Baldwin and Deb Fischer. And when presented with a map of the Middle East in which Syria is highlighted, only half are able to identify the nation correctly.
The Rise of Paid Social Ads: Completing the Integrated Ad Approach
The Rise of Paid Social Ads: Completing the Integrated Ad Approach
Source: Nielsen
Amid the flourishing social media environment, marketers are increasingly viewing paid social media advertising as an integrated part of their marketing tool kits. According to a recent report by Vizu, a Nielsen company, the majority of advertisers say they use paid social media advertising in conjunction with other online and offline advertising (66% and 51%, respectively). Only 5% of advertisers report running primarily social-only campaigns. Social media advertising uses unique tactics—such as sponsored content, brand graphs and influencing the influencers—that have grown to become standard aspects of any integrated campaign.
When asked which online tactics they typically run their paid social media advertising alongside, advertisers’ top three responses were: online display (83%), online video (46%) and mobile (40%). In the offline world, advertisers said they combined their paid social media ads with print (52%), followed by TV (37%).
A Multi-Mix Media Approach Drives New Product Awareness
A Multi-Mix Media Approach Drives New Product Awareness
Source: Nielsen
When it comes to launching a new product, understanding what inspires consumers to try something new is key. The methods to reach and engage consumers vary, but a recent Nielsen global survey of respondents with Internet access indicates that a mix of media and word of mouth advertising garner the most success in raising consumer awareness.
According to new research from Nielsen, in-store discovery (72%) tends to be the largest driver of new product awareness. TV (59%) and print (54%) advertising are leading influencers as well. Of the 21 methods reviewed in the study, however, the advice of family and friends (77%) is the most persuasive when looking for information about new products. Other top methods around the world include receiving a free sample (70%), searching the Internet (67%), and professional/expert word-of-mouth advice (66%).
Globally, the most persuasive awareness drivers, as ranked by the likeliness to purchase a new product when learned via these methods, include a mix of all activities. The survey highlights that word-of-mouth communication spurred by social media and Internet usage is growing in importance. Consumers increasingly find the Internet and mobile are compelling vehicles to get information about new products. However, potential reach and ease of execution varies substantially.
