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This study examines the effectiveness of the Veterans Administration's (VA) public relations and the effectiveness of advertisements of its suicide hotline, which is called the veterans crisis line (VCL). Using the organization-public relations theory (OPR) this study examined whether known failures of VA marketing campaigns for the VCL could be related to public relations factors. This study found that the VA suffers from a negative perception with veterans, and this translated into lower support for the VCL compared to another suicide hotline. This study concludes that ineffective public relations may indeed be a factor in the reluctance of veterans in crisis to call the VCL for life saving mental health support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The continuing technological development of the advertising and public relations (PR) industry and increasing transfer of marketing expenditures from traditional channels to emerging digital media have placed a heavy burden on advertising and PR education. While it is not clear how educators are responding to the digital challenge, this study provides a complete picture of advertising and PR digital media education in the United States. Through a content analysis of curricula from 99 universities with advertising and PR programs, we found that nearly one-quarter (23.5%; n = 1,128) of advertising and PR major courses taught digital media and that digital media education placed greater emphasis on skills courses. Furthermore, the advertising and PR discipline was still based on mass communication, journalism, and marketing rather than computer-related fields. It is hoped that this article will shed some light on the digitalization of future advertising and PR education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study used self-determination theory (SDT) to investigate the motivations for selecting a major among mass communication and media majors at 18 colleges and universities across the United States. Specifically, 669 mass communication majors were queried on their intrinsic and extrinsic motivations for choosing a major, their degree of major satisfaction, and positive outcomes related to academic performance and overall well-being. As a whole, the findings suggest that students who select their major on the basis of its perceived ability to satisfy intrinsic needs tend to be more satisfied with their major selection and report higher levels of academic performance, career surety, and overall life satisfaction. These results are discussed in the context of both post-secondary mass communication programs and students’ ability to successfully navigate the transition into professional life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

US advertising agencies have struggled to attract and retain ethnic and racial minority talent for decades, and the absence of professional mentors has been cited as an issue in job satisfaction among minority employees in the advertising industry. University advertising programs are recognized as an important pipeline of prospective minority hires, especially for agencies. This paper examines a group of minority advertising college seniors in terms of whether they currently have a professional mentor, as well as their career preferences and perceptions of advertising industry employment. The role of mentorship for minority advertising students, as well as implications for advertising educators and employers who seek to diversify their advertising organizations, are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The editorial considers how language used in public health announcements can be counterproductive in leading to desired outcomes, focusing on campaigns aimed to highlight health disparities in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other federal and state health departments. Topics include the National Stakeholder Strategy for Achieving Health Equity, mass media and LGBT health messages, and health and activism.

In recent years, the United States has recognized an increasing need for individual-level disaster preparedness, with federal, state, and local government agencies finding only limited success in instituting campaign-based disaster preparedness programs. Extant research indicates Americans generally remain poorly informed and badly unprepared for imminent disasters. Vested interest theory (Crano, 1997) is presented as a framework for designing and testing the effectiveness of television-based disaster preparedness campaign messages. High- and low-vested versions of an extant control message are compared to assess message efficacy as indicated by behavioral intentions, message acceptance, and preparedness related attitudes. Results indicate television-based video public service announcements manipulated with subtle message variations can be effective at influencing critical preparedness-related attitudes. The high-vested condition performed significantly better than the low-vested and control conditions for both behavioral intentions and perceptions of self-efficacy, two vitally important outcome variables associated with disaster preparedness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]