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Background: Edutainment has long been used as a strategy in health promotion and public health wellness interventions. In March 2019, a large US southeastern university hosted a multimodal theatrical production entitled From Colored to Black (FCTB). The play used a historical lens to broadly address social determinants of health such as disparities in education, access to health services, fair housing and health outcomes. This creative intervention was intended to encourage progressive, justice-oriented attitudes about historically disenfranchised Black communities in North Central Florida. Methods: Driven by an arts-based education approach and constructs from narrative transportation theory, the study employed directed qualitative content analysis to evaluate audience commentary and examine how a play on historic health inequities in Black communities could activate cognition, emotion and imagination for critical thinking about present-day wellbeing. Results: Qualitative survey data in response to the artistic presentation revealed the following subthemes: fascination, assumed truthfulness, satisfaction, feelings of inspiration, enthusiasm, negative attitudes, hopelessness and emotional disconnect. Conclusions: Edutainment continues to be a strong intervention tool. Feedback indicates audience members experienced both highly immersive moments and low transportation-inducing points that ultimately influenced critical reflection on some of the themes addressed in the play.

Using Entman's framing theory, we explored primary news frames in Nigerian newspaper coverage of national opioid abuse. Results yielded 12 news frames: 5 causal frames (Poor governance, Trauma coping mechanism, The perfect trafficking hub, Corrosive culture, Performance boosters), 3 consequential frames (Nigeria as a failing state, Thriving Black Market demand, Uptick in criminal kinsmen: fraudsters and terrorists) and 4 solution frames (Hawkeyed pharmacovigilance, Policy power plays, Drug rehab health services, All hands on deck: strengthening societal values). These research insights represent one of few communication studies on African opioid abuse and offer cultural context for future health intervention strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nielsen reports Black buying power is expected to increase to nearly $2 trillion by 2021. Thus our research is rooted in offering intellectual support to exploring that economic contribution and filling existing gaps in academic literature on the relationship between Black female consumers and personal care brands. In 2018, Black consumers spent millions on personal care products, but a good deal, $473 million, was spent on hair products. This work tests a proposed model on brand-consumer identity congruence between Black female consumers and hair care brands. The model purports a direct connection between identity congruence and purchase intentions. When confronted with the choice of deciding between products from Shea Moisture, a Black founded brand that is perceived to still be Black-owned or the Pantene Gold Series Collection, a mainstream hair care collection that targets Black women, this study found that Black women gravitated toward Shea Moisture. In spite of Pantene's attempt at communicating authentic connection with consumers, the women in this study expressed a preference for Shea Moisture because its image and projected identity was perceived to appeal more to their ethnocentric sensibilities. These findings support our hypotheses and update contemporary branding literature to be more inclusive of Black women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]