The Science Of PSAs: Do Anti-Drug Ads Keep Kids Off Drugs?
Drug Free Is The Way To Be Above The Influence The U.S. has been pouring millions of dollars into anti-drug campaigns since the 1980s. Has it done any good? From Reefer Madness to Nancy Reagan's famous "Just Say No," we're constantly trying to convince kids that drugs aren't as fun as they think they are. The Office of National Drug Control Policy, established in 1988, runs the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, a propaganda machine created to stop kids from using drugs and the money behind anti-drug ad campaigns like "My Anti-Drug" and "Above the Influence." Since it was established in 1998, the government has poured hundreds of millions of dollars a year into buying ad spots for anti-drug propaganda. But does it work? Carson Wagner, now an assistant professor of journalism at Ohio University, wrote his 1998 Penn State master's thesis in media studies on the counter-intuitive effects of...