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This paper contributes to emerging discourse about the ongoing challenges and opportunities of social marketing as a discipline. The paper presents a qualitative perspective on existing challenges faced by social marketing and offers suggestions for addressing these challenges. Nine semi-structured interviews with social marketing academics and practitioners from six different countries were conducted. Thematic analysis was used to analyse and interpret the qualitative data. The study provides insight into existing challenges for social marketing, classified into three key themes according to their position within or outside of the discipline: 1) poor branding of the discipline as an internal challenge, 2) competing disciplines as an external challenge, and 3) overall reach of the discipline, seen as both an internal and external challenge. The findings suggest that social marketing needs to overcome poor branding issues to sufficiently address external challenges. We conclude by arguing for a more robust marketing of the discipline. While scholars have identified the challenges and opportunities for social marketing as a discipline, they have paid little attention to examining these challenges from the viewpoint of expert practitioners and academics. This paper presents a nuanced contextual understanding of the identified challenges through a qualitative perspective and explores how social marketing can overcome these challenges.

Purpose This paper presents the first attempt to map and critically review existing social marketing planning approaches. Approach Critical literature review. Findings The discussion highlights that existing social marketing planning approaches have moved on from older product-driven models towards a more customer/ citizen-oriented, stakeholder engagement and value creation narrative. There is also a growing connection between social marketing planning approaches and theories from other disciplines. This recognises that a simple push marketing strategy, which was the working principle of many early social marketingplanning approaches, is not often effective for contemporary social marketing practice. Effective social marketing planning requires a greater emphasis on new social marketing principles derived from the new global consensus social marketing definition, such as more citizen focus, sustainable outcomes, and ethical practice, thus highlighting a need for more comprehensive social marketing planning approaches with a better understanding of recent theory development of social marketing as a field in order to be relatable and efficient. Implications The review sets out some original thinking about how planning in the field of social marketing can be strengthened through a more inclusive adoption of both system thinking analysis and integration with other fields of theory and practice that are seeking to influence behaviour for social good. Limitations This review is exploratory in nature and evaluates only 14 social marketing planning approaches; more social marketing approaches exist and could be considered in further reviews.

Purpose: This paper presents a systematic review of the use of social marketing principles in sexual health studies in order to determine the effectiveness of the programmes. Method: A systematic literature review method was used, and Andreasen’s (2002) benchmark criteria were adopted to analyse the use of social marketing principles in the selected studies.Findings: There is evidence of full use of some elements of Andreasen’s (2002) benchmark criteria, for example consumer research, behaviour change objectives and segmentation. The use of the marketing mix theory and exchange elements were limited, whereas the evidence of the use of competition is not noted. In addition, the majority of the selected studies focus on short-term objectives, leading to varying and inconsistent outcomes. Overall, no single element of Andreasen’s (2002) benchmark criteria was independently associated with the success of any of the selected studies. Implication: The review highlights a need to use more social marketing principles in planning and implementing sexual health programmes to enhance their effectiveness. Improvement in performance might be achieved through the development and application of a new social marketing informed methodology for designing social programmes on sexual health.

This chapter examines research from an interpretive perspective where qualitative methods are predominantly used. We present that qualitative methods may be used by researchers seeking to gain deeper insights and understanding of underlying issues particularly in the context of social science studies which often involve people and organisations in a social setting. We will argue that such methods can be used within an interpretive philosophy, or may be combined with quantitative methods in a pragmatic and mixed methods approach. Whilst the chapter considers traditional methods associated with qualitative research, such as depth interview and focus group, it also introduces several alternative methods and techniques which may be used by researchers seeking to gain creativity in their research design and presentation and provide deeper understanding to build their analysis and research conclusions. The chapter is arranged in two parts. In part one, we examine issues of context, philosophy, approach and strategy. In part two, we examine issues of strategy and methods, planning, data collection, and data presentation.

Background: A ‘learner identity’ can be broadly defined as how an individual feels about himself/herself as a learner and the extent to which he/she describes himself/herself as a ‘learner’. The literature suggests that those from non-traditional backgrounds may struggle to adapt to a university environment with all its related expectations (e.g. Reay, Crozier, and Clayton 2009). This paper examines the idea of learner identity in the context of marketing undergraduates. Learner identity is investigated from a widening participation (WP) perspective.Purpose: This small-scale study investigates the links between marketing students’ learner identities, backgrounds and subject choice. It was hypothesised that marketing students, having selected a degree in a specific business discipline, were likely to be aware of employability issues and may be committed to their learning, leading to relatively strong learning identities. This hypothesis was based on an assumption that those students who have chosen a degre...

Long-term storage of natural tissues or tissue-engineered constructs is critical to allow off-the-shelf availability. Vitrification is a method of cryopreservation that eliminates ice formation, as ice may be detrimental to the function of natural or bioartificial tissues. In order to achieve the vitreous state, high concentrations of CPAs must be added and later removed. The high concentrations may be deleterious to cells as the CPAs are cytotoxic and single-step addition or removal will result in excessive osmotic excursions and cell death. A previously described mathematical model accounting for the mass transfer of CPAs through the sample matrix and cell membrane was expanded to incorporate heat transfer and CPA cytotoxicity. Simulations were performed for two systems, an encapsulated system of insulin-secreting cells and articular cartilage, each with different transport properties, geometry and size. Cytotoxicity and mass transfer are dependent on temperature, with a higher temperature allowing more rapid mass transfer but also causing increased cytotoxicity. The effects of temperature are exacerbated for articular cartilage, which has larger dimensions and slower mass transport through the matrix. Simulations indicate that addition and removal at 4°C is preferable to 25°C, as cell death is higher at 25°C due to increased cytotoxicity in spite of the faster mass transport. Additionally, the model indicates that less cytotoxic CPAs, especially at high temperature, would significantly improve the cryopreservation outcome. Overall, the mathematical model allows the design of addition and removal protocols that ensure CPA equilibration throughout the sample while still minimizing CPA exposure and maximizing cell survival.

Cryoprotectant (CPA) cytotoxicity constitutes a challenge in developing cryopreservation protocols, specifically in vitrification where high CPA concentrations are necessary to achieve the ice-free, vitreous state. Few cytotoxicity studies have investigated vitrification-relevant concentrations of CPAs, and the benefits and disadvantages of cocktail solutions and of incorporating non-permeating solutes have not been fully evaluated. In this study, we address these issues by determining the cytotoxicity kinetics for dimethylsulfoxide (Me2SO) and 1,2-propanediol (PD) on alginate-encapsulated βTC-tet mouse insulinomas for a range of concentrations and temperatures. Cytotoxicity kinetics were also determined for two cocktails, DPS (3M Me2SO + 3M PD + 0.5M sucrose) and PEG400 (1M Me2SO + 5M PD + 0.34 M poly(ethylene)glycol with M.W. of 400). PD was found to be more cytotoxic than Me2SO at higher concentrations and temperatures. This was reflected in PEG400 being more cytotoxic at room temperature than PEG400 at 4°C or DPS at either temperature. Addition of non-permeating solutes increased the cytotoxicity of cocktails. Furthermore, results indicate that CPA cytotoxicity may not be additive and that combining CPAs may increase cytotoxicity synergistically. Finally, when comparing cytotoxic effects towards encapsulated HepG2 and βTC-tet cells, and towards βTC-tet cells in capsules and in monolayers, CPAs appear more cytotoxic towards cells with higher metabolic activity. The incorporation of these results in the rational design of CPA addition/removal processes in vitrification is discussed.