Event segmentation: A review and research agenda

Event academics and practitioners have long recognized the importance of segmenting event attendees. Despite a relatively long level of enquiry into event segmentation, there is little consistency in the methods, data analysis techniques and segmentation variables that are used. A review of 120 event segmentation studies incorporating an attendee-orientated approach was conducted to identify how event attendees are currently segmented. This study will serve as a reference guide to current event segmentation researchers on the segmentation approach/s and data analysis techniques utilized in previous studies. Recommendations for future research are suggested.     

Seeing through a Glass Onion: broadening and deepening formative research in social marketing through a mixed methods approach

ABSTRACT

The purpose of formative research in social marketing is to understand the target audience to generate consumer insight, which informs the planning, development and initial implementation of social marketing programmes. Focus groups, interviews or surveys, all of which are self-report methods, are the most commonly reported methods employed in formative research. Reliance on a relatively narrow range of methods may constrain understanding and insight gained during formative research. This paper challenges social marketers to mix methods or use multiple methods and research perspectives to generate a broader understanding of the consumer and the context in which they behave. A case study is used to demonstrate how mixed methods were used in a formative research study to inform the development of a social marketing programme designed to change eating behaviour. Challenges of mixed methods are detailed along with recommendations for future research.     

Different strokes for different folks: A method to accommodate decision -making heterogeneity

Consumer decision making is complex and no single perspective offers a complete theory of consumer decision making. While the research community acknowledges that there is heterogeneity, homogenous choice models dominate consumer decision research. This paper provides insights from one method that was designed to accommodate decision -making heterogeneity. Computer process tracing methods can be used to observe different consumer decisions in one product category to understand what and how people choose. More than two-hundred and fifty decisions were observed in this research. Consumers were asked to select one of nine air conditioner alternatives described with six salient attributes. The research findings clearly reveal consumer differences. Specifically, the attributes and decision types used differed resulting in different product choices. This paper reveals how methods that accommodate decision -making heterogeneity can be used by retailers to inform product ranging decisions for categories.     

Social marketing theory development goals: an agenda to drive change

ABSTRACT

Environmental, health, and social change is complex and frequently is framed as a problem(s) to be solved. This framing focuses effort on delivery of solutions designed to change systemic environmental, health, and social problems. Theory, an organising framework for effort, remains under-utilised in behavioural and social sciences. An individual psychological lens dominates and emphasis is placed on explaining and predicting individual behaviour and not behavioural change. It is time to break free and deliver frameworks that extend focus beyond individuals to all citizens, and apply new evaluation approaches that assess individual and structural changes. Ten Social Marketing Theory Development Goals (goals) categorised in three groups: (i) research design; (ii) building social marketing theory; and (iii) methodological innovation are outlined to assist social marketers to develop new ways of thinking that will deliver the theory and evidence base needed to outline what practitioners and policy makers should do to effect change.     

Estimating the Effect of Redistricting on Minority Substantive Representation

This article applies modern Bayesian roll call analysis to estimatelegislators' support for minority-favored policies, and to determinethe likely impact of competing redistricting plans on the substantiverepresentation of minority interests. We first provide a theoryof districting and policy outcomes that points to the importanceof coalition building in advancing minority policy concernsand motivates our estimation techniques. We then apply thismethodology to the redistricting of the South Carolina StateSenate following the 1990 census. We show that this redistrictingled to more minorities being elected to office but less substantiverepresentation.     

A Socioecological Examination of Observing Littering Behavior

Despite evidence of the negative health, environmental, and economic impacts, littering continues to be a problem and therefore warrants ongoing research attention. Guided by a Behavioural Ecological Framework, this study observed individual-, social-, and environmental-level factors on littering behavior across three different parks in Saudi Arabia. A total of 362 individuals were observed over 12 days. Approximately half of all disposals were improper, with litter left on the ground. The most commonly littered object was nuts (29.4%). The findings revealed that environmental factors had a significant impact, including the amount of existing litter, beautification efforts, and distance to rubbish bins, and that the only significant individual factor to have any impact on individual littering behavior was group size. Implications for litter prevention are discussed. Future research opportunities are outlined.     

Legislative Organization Under Separate Powers

Existing theories of legislative organization attribute thestrong committee system in the U.S. Congress to members' distributive,informational, or partisan needs. But legislators elsewhereshare these same motivations, yet not all have chosen to organizethemselves in a similar fashion. Therefore the strong committeesystem must derive to some extent from the larger constitutionalcontext, including plurality winner elections, bicameralism,and our focus, the system of separate powers. In particularwe argue that committees established in part to oversee executiveagencies will have preferences biased against those of the executive.Thus committees serve as contrary outliers, acting as a counterweightto executive branch policy making. We find support for thisprediction with data drawn from all standing committees fromthe 80th to 102nd Congresses. We also find that each of theseemingly incompatible theories of legislative organizationpredicts well patterns of committee composition in differentissue areas.     

Exploring the impact of self‐construal and cultural intelligence on alcohol consumption: implications for social marketing

• There is enormous cross‐cultural variation in alcohol choices and drinking behaviour. Because of the inherent differences in historical drinking culture, as well as differences in alcohol policy globally, similarities and differences in drinking patterns have long been a focus of interest among public health and social marketing researchers. Thus, the purposes of this study are (1) to explore differences between groups (Australian and non‐Australian‐born respondents) on self‐construal, cultural intelligence and alcohol consumption and (2) to investigate the impact of self‐construal and cultural intelligence on alcohol consumption in Australia. Data for this study were collected through a large public university in Australia (N = 669). The paper found that people with interdependent self‐concept were less likely to drink alcohol than people with independent self‐concept and cultural intelligence was not significantly related to hazardous alcohol use, harmful alcohol use and dependence symptoms. Variations between Australian‐born and overseas‐born groups were evident. Limitations of the current study and an agenda for future research are outlined.

Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Indonesian healthy living intentions: Segmentation study insights

Obesity is a global epidemic. The very rapid growth rates of obesity prevalence observed in developing countries is alarming. Segmentation is under applied in social marketing and, when it is applied, it is based primarily on demographic data in samples drawn from developed nations. The current study adopts psychographic segmentation to understand lifestyle attitudes and intentions towards exercise and weight loss among an Indonesian sample. TwoStep cluster analysis (n = 499) identified 4 distinct segments (At risk, Conscious healthy, Overweight, and Tryers). The results of this study demonstrate that different groups exist in the larger population and that consideration of these groups may assist social marketers in creating service/intervention offerings that meet the needs of a broader range of people in the market, thus extending penetration of campaigns that address obesity.     

A Hierarchy-of-Effects Approach to Designing a Social Marketing Game

While there is great enthusiasm and interest by social marketers for games as a social marketing intervention, there is little evidence of the impact of these games. This research seeks to fill this gap by testing a theoretical model based on the experiential hierarchy of effects. An online game about the physiological effects of drinking was designed for high-school students and implemented in an educational curriculum with 223 participants (96% response rate) completing an online survey. The data was analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM) and showed support for nine of the eleven hypotheses. The results show game characteristics of enjoyment (feel), knowledge (learn), and challenge (do) significantly related to attitudes and moderate-drinking behavioral intentions, ability to control drinking, and awareness of the physical consequences of drinking. There were no gender differences.