Download Essay on Article evaluation - Introduction to Communication Research | COMM 1024 and more Papers Communication in PDF only on Docsity! Intro To Comm Research Article Evaluation The purpose of the research was to find the relationship between the information given in Philip Morris values advocacy messages and the participant's theoretical behavior as a result of receiving this information in court while serving as a jury member. There was no specific communication theory referenced by the author in the literature review. Since this was an exploratory study and therefore qualitative, there was no actual predictions. A target public of 37 active moms was gathered using a non-probability volunteer sampling method. To conduct the research, the author chose the focus group method. The message content and participant type were independent variables, while the the intention of the participant's behavior was the dependent variable. The results were that values advocacy messages brought on strong emotions in most of the participants, and that values advocacy messages have the ability to change the behavior of the participants toward an organization. Their responses were broken down into four categories: corporate cynics, capitalist soldiers, motive seekers, and fact finders. When interpreting the values advocacy messages, the participants used the history, corporate reputation, and the values which they associated with Philip Morris 30-40% of participants were willing to reduce punitive damages based on the information presented in the Philip Morris values advocacy campaign. It rose to 50-55% if they used the same scenario with an different corporation. Annotation The were many strengths to this study. The focus group research method was an in-depth procedure and so the participants produced in-depth data. The instruments used were also very successful and helped keep very organized, detailed records of the data. By placing the participants into one of four categories based on their response, it helped simplify and clarify the results. Still, there were also some weakness. Only one corporation's values advocacy message was studied. Also, it's geographic scope was only limited one small area, and focused only on one target public, active moms. If follow-up research were to be done, they could try to focus on the weak points of the original study. They could make the study broader by using different corporations as well as expanding the study nationally. Because the study was limited to the greater Indianapolis area, it's possible that many regions of the country were not equally represented. Also, the way the company was perceived could be based on the individual community, so a national sample would better analyze the geographic similarities and differences. Lastly, the target public should be expanded to include different demographics, such as gender, education or age.
