News by Subject Policy & Ethics

In response to US restrictions on where tobacco companies are allowed to advertise their products, the industry now dedicates nearly all of its $9 billion advertising budget to activities occurring in retail settings. A new study by researchers at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health fills an important gap by documenting specific characteristics of storefront tobacco advertisements in the context of today's diverse tobacco product landscape.

Charitable and humanitarian organizations are increasingly tapping into a $30 billion crowdfunding market, not only to raise funds but to build donors' trust by being more transparent, according to research from Indiana University's Kelley School of Business.

Researchers from the University of Connecticut and Free University of Berlin published new research in the INFORMS journal Management Science that provides companies with substantiated, actionable insights on strategies for effectively responding to situations where their highly compensated celebrity endorsers generate negative publicity.

Pitt scientists find a viral anti-vaccination Facebook campaign wasn't 'all about autism,' but instead centered on four distinct themes.

Canada's largest food and beverage manufacturers could aim higher to improve nutrition, reduce obesity and prevent chronic disease, according to a new report by University of Toronto researchers. The study is the first to evaluate Canada's biggest food and beverage companies based on their policies and commitments to sell healthier products.

New research led by the University of East Anglia suggests that people with a positive attitude are more likely to eat healthily. The study examined the motivational role of a theory called regulatory focus on consumers' involvement in nutrition, that is, the time and effort they put in to finding out about nutrition and seeking out nutritious food. It also examined the effect of nutrition involvement on consumers' knowledge of nutrition and dietary behavior.

Tobacco conglomerates that used colors, flavors and marketing techniques to entice children as future smokers transferred these same strategies to sweetened beverages when they bought food and drink companies starting in 1963, according to a study by researchers at UC San Francisco.

As the FDA looks for more information on e-cigarettes and e-juice flavors, a new Dartmouth study shows that adolescents and young adults cite appealing flavors as a main reason for using e-cigarettes, that they are more likely to turn to fruit- and candy-flavored cigarettes than adult smokers trying to quit who more commonly prefer tobacco flavors, and that the younger population are likely to use multiple e-cigarette flavors at the same time.

It's not difficult to verify whether a new piece of information is accurate; however, most people don't take that step before sharing it on social media, regardless of age, social class or gender, a new Ohio University study has found.