Not Ready To Go: A Powerful Message Against Impaired Driving

PSV HD5 Public Service Awareness

1. The PSA of MADD targeted one ethnic (cultural) group in particular in its campaigns called “Honoring Our Spirit”.  Why did they do this and what did they do to increase their success with this group?  Do you support this campaign or find it inappropriate in any way. Explain.
2. Health surveys show that more than 60% of the adults and the youth in the First Nations of Canada consume alcohol on a daily basis among which some suffer fatal or dreadful consequences due to drunk driving. This goes on adding to the traumatic experiences of the people of the First Nations  and the Metis people. It is because of this that MADD had taken the effort to reach out to the particular Aboriginal group of Canada. In order to increase their success with the group they closely observed the cultures of the group and tried to identify with their pain by allowing them to tell their own stories of loss and grief and their process of healing (1). The campaign is appropriate and effective. This is because for years the Aboriginal people of Canada have been traumatized for various reasons especially for losing their loved ones to drunk driving. The campaign raises awareness among the people of community against alcohol and assures them that they can always reach out for support.
3. Summarize 3 of the videos and impartially analyze how effective you think each is.  In a fourth paragraph, elaborate on one that impacted you the most, offering support for your position.
4. MADD’s “The Heart of the Matter” tells the stories of the victim families who had lost their loved ones to impaired driving. The stories deal with the grief and the trauma of each family who have been affected by the loss of their loved ones in accidents due to impaired driving (4).

The video “Not Ready to Go” by MADD tells the story of five teenagers who were killed and nine teenagers who were injured in a multi-vehicle crash due to impaired driving (2). The story is told by the survivors of the crash and the families of the victims as well as by the people who provided emergency services.

The video “It’ll Cost you Big Time” demonstrates the social and financial impacts and effects of impaired driving on the families and the victims (3).

The video that had the most influential effect was “Not Ready Go”. This is because it addresses the teenagers of today’s generation on the negative impact of alcohol and impaired driving. Given to the fact that alcohol and drunk driving is a major issue among teenagers today, the video is a strong statement that shows the ugly side of impaired driving and how it negatively affects our loved ones.

1. If a PSA campaign leader sought your advice about a creating one targeted at you and your peer group (your generation, and within your sub-culture), what would you stress to be the most important and effective ways to connect with or influence your peer culture (media, issues, strategies, tools, methods, etc)?
2. In order to connect with and influence the present generation the PSA campaign leader must use the social media for channeling the campaign. It is so because social media has become highly popular among the youth of today’s generation with the advancement of technologies. The issues that should be addressed to are alcohol abuse, drug abuse, and depression that are major critical issues in the present world. This can be done by demonstrating the causes and the impacts of such issues in the lives of the people through campaign videos, documentaries, and talk sessions.
3. Consider a PSA that has affected you at some point in your life. Reflect on what the issue was, why it struck you, how it was presented and through what forms of media. Or else, consider a PSA that did not strike you, and think on what could have made the campaign more effective.
4. The Public Service Announcement (PSA) that was most influential was the one undertaken by the Welsh Agency to create awareness of the dreadful and fatal impacts of texting while driving. The PSA was channeled through a video that depicted three teenagers texting while driving and violent and fatal consequences that they as well as others face. The video was presented through a video on the social media platform of YouTube. The major thing that made the campaign attractive was its realistic and critical standards. Texting while driving is a major issue that has led to multiple accidents especially among teenagers and needs to be dealt with on a priority basis. This PSA in context chose to address this major issue and had a wide and huge effect on its audience.
5. What do you believe are three most pressing issues/concerns facing young people today? Offer support for your choices, indicating where you encounter evidence of this, and how you see young people being affected.
6. Three most pressing issues that the youth of the present generation are facing are drugs and alcohol abuse, depression and obesity. It has been seen that most of the young people in the present generation are highly addicted to drugs and alcohol that affects not only them but their families and loved ones as well. A significant percentage of young people in Canada are addicted to alcohol and drugs and face negative consequences of their addiction. Such addiction can lead to negative consequences like overdose, accidents and crimes related to substance abuse (5). Depression is also a leading issue among the youth of today. About 12-27% of the Canadian youth is suffering from depression (5). Depression has increased the suicidal rates among the youth and has also led poor mental health conditions (6). Obesity is another rising issue among the youth today. Most of the youth suffer from obesity today due to their unhealthy and casual attitude towards life. About 26% Canadian youths are suffering from obesity today (6). Obesity leads to various diseases like heart problems, respiratory problems, pregnancy problems and other health disorders.

1. What type of message do you want to send?  Be concrete – clear and specific. What are the goals and objectives of this campaign?  Give some sense of your passion or concerns be referring to evidence of this being a problem in your estimation.
2. The message that is to be sent in the PSA campaign is that drugs and alcohol abuse has adverse effects on a person and the surroundings. The goals and objectives of the campaign is to create awareness about the rising problem of drugs and alcohol abuse and to find ways to mitigate such issues. Substance abuse is a major problem worldwide and especially Canada. Substance abuse is more prominently witnessed among the youth between the ages of 12 and 24. Surveys demonstrate that tobacco, alcohol and cannabis are some of the most common substances used by the Canadian youth (5). Surveys have also shown the increasing rates of substance abuse among the youth of Canada today causing them permanent or partial damage.
3. Who is your target audience (be sure to narrow down a specific demographic)? Profile your target group, referring to several specific traits/aspects that identify them?
4. The target audience would be the Canadian youth. The target audience of the campaign are the Canadian youth who are troubled with alcohol and drugs abuse. The target audience are characterized with mood swings, anxiety disorder due, sensation seeking, depression, and impulsiveness.
5. What are the kinds of information will youneed from your “focus group” to create an effective campaign?Remember, your focus group is your testing field, so you can poll them any way you desire to narrow down the focus of your pitch.
6. The kind of information that would needed from the focus group are the reasons that led to taking up alcohol and drugs, the health effects of such, the social effects, the long-term harms caused, and how does the substance abuse affect the related people and surroundings.
7. List some specific questions you’ll beasking and having your focus group respond to. Give some sense for the merits of your questions (i.e. why these specific questions).
8. The questions to be asked are:
9. What made the person to take up drugs and alcohol? –this is important to understand the source and the cause of the issue.
10. How did drugs and alcohol affect the health of the person? –this is important to understand the adverse health effects of substance abuse.
11. How did the people and the surrounding react to the person’s problem of substance abuse? –this would help in the determination of the extent to which the society has worked towards addressing the issue and to understand how are the people and the society affected by the issue of substance abuse.
12. After you conducted some field investigation with your target group, did you encounter any surprises?  Did anything you learned affect your choice of Ad campaign? Give some explanation
13. After the conduction of the filed investigation it was seen that nearly more than half of the young population of Canada had given to substance abuse due to peer pressure. This was a huge surprise considering the extent to which peer pressure can cause negative influences among the youth. This affected the choice of the ad campaign as the gravity of the issue that was undermined before had come to the front demanding immediate action.
14. Which of the following approachesdid you select for your message, and why?

• Positive Consequences – emphasizing positive consequences to be achieved
• Resistance Strategies – emphasizing different ways that teens can resist pressure
• Negative Strategy – emphasizing specific negative consequences

1. The negative strategy of emphasizing on certain negative consequences is used to approach the issue and purpose of the campaign. This is because the demonstration of the negative consequences would allow the targeted audience to identify with the issues and realize the extent of harm being caused. It would also help to create awareness among the audience about the importance to refrain from substance abuse.
2. What type of advertisement will you be creating (radio script, TV spot, print, Web-based, collage, power point)? Why this medium? What are some of the challenges or limits; what are some of the benefits?
3. A TV spot would be created for the advertisement. This medium will be chosen since a television or the traditional media can be accessed and is present in every household. Moreover, audio-visual articles attract more interests among people. The challenges of using this medium is that it is not cost effective and that it fails to target a specific group of audience  providing emphasis on a particular group and agenda. The benefits of using this medium is that reaches the global network and is not restricted to one demographic location and also that it is able to gain better attention from the audience.
4. What will be the best scenario for getting your message across? (Are there any characters? If so, how many? Do you tell a story? A biographical profile? A focus on facts and figures?)
5. The best possible way to spread the message is through telling the real-life biographical stories through the people who have actually been the victims of substance abuse and its harmful consequences. This would allow the audience to identify with the people depicted and would raise better concern about the issue in context.
6. What impression do you want to leave your audience with?
7. The audience should be left with a positive impression of taking initiatives to refrain themselves from substance abuse in order to lead a better and harmless life.
8. What can you do to make your PSA ad unique from other advertisements?
9. The advertisement can depict the biographies of the victims from all over the world with special attention to the Canadian youth to achieve and attract audience on a global level.

References

1.  MADD Canada. Honouring Our Spirit [Internet]. 2008 [cited 4 February 2018]. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5puDKhHGu2U
2. MADD Canada. MADD Canada – Not Ready To Go [Internet]. 2015 [cited 4 February 2018]. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XPJU8BnM0A
3.  MADD Canada. MADD Canada – Impaired Driving – It’ll Cost You Big Time [Internet]. 2015 [cited 4 February 2018]. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8cZgvNucvo
4. MADD Canada | Research Library [Internet]. Madd.ca. 2018 [cited 4 February 2018]. Available from: https://www.madd.ca/english/research/media.html
5. Pearson C, Janz T, Ali J. Mental and substance use disorders in Canada. Ottawa, Ontario: Statistics Canada; 2013 Sep.
6. Morrison KM, Shin S, Tarnopolsky M, Taylor VH. Association of depression & health related quality of life with body composition in children and youth with obesity. Journal of affective disorders. 2015 Feb 1;172:18-23.