Healthy Skepticism Library item: 2800

Warning: This library includes all items relevant to health product marketing that we are aware of regardless of quality. Often we do not agree with all or part of the contents.

Publication type: Journal Article

Smart RG.
Silver bullets and overkill: ethical advertisements for psychoactive drugs
1973; 14

Abstract:

Two hundred and sixty-one journal advertisements for psychoactive drugs appearing in 1973 were analyzed. Ads appeared more frequently than was expected. Very few ads were explicitly for the normal hazards and anxieties of everyday life. Negative effects and contraindications always appear in small print, never in colour and away from the main body of the ad. In general, the idea that psychoactives are “silver bullets’ is much less common in adds than it was in the mid 1960s.

Keywords:
*analytic survey/journal advertisements/psychotropic drugs/quality of information/EVALUATION OF PROMOTION: JOURNAL ADVERTISEMENTS