Drug Education and Mass Media

Television, radio and magazines play a major role in forming the perceptions, attitudes and
opinions of people, many of whom are strongly influenced by television programmes or
articles on illness - and health related issues, like HIV/AIDS and psychoactive substances,
such as medicines or drugs. Often they are exposed to advertising messages that try to
persuade them to buy a specific medicine to prevent or to cure a certain disease.
People are also influenced by television programmes such as movies, soap operas or detective
series that dramatise or glamorize drug use and drug users and which have a great impact on
opinions and behaviour of which most people are unaware.
Over the past twenty years, drug education has been making increasing use of the
possibilities of mass media to pass on educational messages to a large audience.
Superficially, the only similarity between all these types of campaigns seems to be that they
all make use of mass media based on the assumption that mass media campaigns greatly
influence people's behaviour. On many other points, such differences exist as to make much
more difficult any qualitative comparison between campaigns. Furthermore, especially in the
older campaigns, clearly formulated, operational objectives in terms of hoped-for changes in
attitude, social norms or behaviour are sadly lacking. Mostly there is nothing more than
"awareness of the damaging effects of drug abuse" or "change of mentality", "influencing
social norms" goals that can hardly be measured scientifically. A positive development has,
however, recently been observed, which is probably linked with newly acquired insights in
mass communication studies. Previous campaigns were particularly characterised by
untargeted bombardments of information, based on the then popular "hypodermic needle
theory" of the effects of mass media whereas over the past 15 years many more campaigns
have been aimed.
The National Institute on Alcoholism and Alcohol Abuse (NIAAA) in the USA,
has run separate mass media campaigns for specific social groups, such as drivers
("If you drink, don't drive, if you drive don't drink"), pregnant woman ("Pregnant?
Before you drink think!") and young people. Relevant opinion leaders are selected
and local support provided for the campaigns. Use is made of recently acquired
scientific insights, for example, fear arousal techniques (slow motion replay of a
drunk driver knocking down a child), and the latest research findings on the use of
media, and the mechanisms of selectivity and exposure are taken into account.
Models:
Principles of Mass Media
To most people mass media means television, radio and newspapers. This is partly correct,
but education makes use of a much wider arsenal of media, such as posters, leaflets,
brochures, videos, etc. A general characteristic of mass media is that, in principle, nobody is
excluded, mass media are public, accessible to everybody. But there are also many
differences. The best-known, that is, television and radio, reach virtually everybody, contrary
to a poster in a station, whose message is seen only by train passengers. Television exerts a
great influence, not only because this powerful medium reaches many people, but also
because it has an aura of authority. Television is also a penetrating medium because it has an
audio as well as a visual dimension which can be used to great advantage given the present
level of television technology.
The printed media, and radio in particular, rather trail behind this development. In the world
of the media and in drug and health education circles, a distinction is often made between
high-key and low key use of mass media. These concepts apply to the medium of choice, as
well as to the way in which media are used. Television is the most frequently used high-key
medium because it is so large-scale, is generally considered to be authoritative and reliable
and offers many possibilities. Printed media, like newspapers, weeklies and brochures are
much more low-key. Not everybody is literate, reads the same newspaper, or the same
weekly. Besides, exposure to an educational message or an advertisement is much more
indirect; it is part of a number of other messages and so there is selectivity on the part of the
reader.
The following example of a recent high-key American mass media campaign can
serve to illustrate this somewhat theoretical point. The United States of America
has contended with probably the largest drug problem in the Western world, and
for some years a "War on drugs" has been declared. Recently, instead of strong
emphasis on tracing and prosecuting drug traffickers, there is now more stress on
discouraging Americans to use drugs, with slogans like "Using is losing".
At the end of 1986, more than 200 American advertising agencies set up the
"Media Advertising Partnership for a Drug free America" (MAPDA) (18). The
largest anti-drug campaign ever initiated was begun in 1987 involving a total
budget of about 3 billion dollars. The organizers of this tremendous campaign first
carried out wide-range market research on the basis of which about 50 different
campaigns were developed. The campaign was split into three main target groups -
youngsters, adults between 18 and 35 and older people. Youngsters were chosen
because they are curious and have strong experimental instincts. Adults aged
between 18 and 35 are often indifferent to drug abuse, are not aware of the risks
and often assume the attitude: "Some use drugs, some drink too much". The third
large target group of older people is furthest away from drug abuse, having very
little knowledge of drugs and many misconceptions. The anti-drug campaigns set
up are very varied. Besides those already mentioned, there are separate campaigns
for numerous target groups such as sportsmen and women, show business
personalities, opinion leaders, educators. Special campaigns were run for
marijuana, cocaine, crack and heroin. There is no general emphasis on the
damaging long-term effects of drug abuse but, particularly in the campaigns for
youngsters, much stress is laid on the short term adverse effects. The campaigns
are very high-key, using a dramatic tone, a double vocabulary, a language couched
in teenage slang. TV commercials are as shocking as they are oversimplified to
pound home messages to the public, such as "Drugs are a dead end". Full page
advertisements are printed in well-known papers and magazines like Playboy and
include emotional slogans such as "Cocaine, it can cost you your brain".
There are many different kinds and types of group methods: methods and techniques that
stress transfer of knowledge (lectures, classroom teaching), attitude change (discussion, role
playing), development of social skills (training, modelling) or exploration and exchange of
opinion (panel, forum). The best way to elaborate and illustrate group methods and
techniques in drug education, is to refer to school drug education. The main arguments for
choosing this formal educational context are:
- It is within formal education that most children and young people can be
reached for preventive education;
- School settings have a clear organisational structure, with opportunities to
develop links with parents, community groups, etc;
- School settings are, in spite of many cultural and societal differences, present in
all countries and regions in the world;
- Most drug educational experiences have been acquired within a formal education
context during the past 30 years;
- Many different school drug education methods can also be applied to other group
and community settings; in most cases only a few adaptations have to be made;
- Most experimentation with drug use starts during school when children are
between 14-18 years old.
Knowledge and drug information model
For a long time, health and drug information education was a popular first choice strategy in
prevention and it is still a commonly used method. The underlying assumption is that the
presentation of factual information about drugs and the biological, social and psychological
effects, the risks and dangers of drug use and its consequences, would have a sufficient
preventive impact. Knowing the facts would lead directly to staying off drugs. In this model,
besides techniques of fear arousal, often applied to increase the salience and impact of the
message: "Drugs are a dead end" and "Using is losing" rather moderate techniques are often
also used. The British "High Profile Curriculum".
Affective education model
This model was developed in the seventies and presents a rather different model of drug
education where drug information plays only a minor role. The affective education model is
based on the assumption that drug abuse has its main cause in the shortcomings of young
personalities low self-esteem, inability to make rational decisions and express feelings and
inadequate problem-solving skills. Therefore, the main goal of prevention should be
enhancing self-esteem, improvement of decision-making and problem solving skills. This
model IS largely rooted in the principles of humanistic psychology, the expectation being that
once a young person has solved his or her basic interpersonal problems, the risk of
involvement in drug abuse will be much lower. The Californian School and Community
Prevention Programme '20) is a very recent example of a drug prevention programme
developed according to these principles.
Social influence model
This approach is based on Bandura's Social Learning Theory which focuses on the notion that
behaviour is the result of positive or negative influences. Individuals in the social
environment, like parents and peers, and exposure to the media often serve as impact models,
providing examples of adequate or inadequate behaviour. Prevention programmes designed
within the framework of the social influence approach comprise elements such as influence
resisting training (peer, media influences) innoculation against the impact of mass media
(analyzing anti-health advertising), role playing, etc.
More recent is the model of reasoned action developed by Fishbein and Ajzen (21). The
Dutch drug prevention programme "Talking about alcohol and drugs at school" '22) and the
British programme "Facts and Feelings about Drugs, but Decisions about Situation" 
Life skills model of drug education
A most promising new approach is the life skills development model of prevention. Whilst,
there is a conceptual similarity between the life skills model and the affective model, the
former emphasizes balanced development of personal and social coping skills, which can be
divided into five dimensions critically important for adolescent learning, thinking, feeling,
decision making, communication and action. The model encompasses the improvement of
positive peer influence, peer role models and peer teaching and includes teaching specific
values, such as respect, compassion, responsibility, honesty and self-discipline. This
programme attempts to link community groups and school groups (teachers, tutors,
counselors, parents, board members), because of the belief that prevention and health
education is the collective responsibility of the whole school and local community. The life
skills approach is a challenging model, appropriate for both drug prevention and health
promotion. The well-known "Skills for Adolescents" programme, originally developed in the
USA '24), has now been culturally adapted and introduced in many countries, including inter
alia, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, France, The Netherlands, Belgium and Sweden.