Alcohol Marketing on Twitter and Instagram: Evidence of Directly Advertising to Youth/Adolescents.

AIMS Assess whether alcohol companies restrict youth/adolescent access, interaction, and exposure to their marketing on Twitter and Instagram. METHODS Employed five fictitious male and female Twitter (n = 10) and Instagram (n = 10) user profiles aged 13, 15, 17, 19 and/or 21. Using cellular smartphones, we determined whether profiles could (a) interact with advertising content-e.g. retweet, view video or picture content, comment, share URL; and/or (b) follow and directly receive advertising material updates from the official Instagram and Twitter pages of 22 alcohol brands for 30 days. RESULTS All user profiles could fully access, view, and interact with alcohol industry content posted on Instagram and Twitter. Twitter's age-gate, which restricts access for those under 21, successfully prevented underage profiles from following and subsequently receiving promotional material/updates. The two 21+ profiles collectively received 1836 alcohol-related tweets within 30 days. All Instagram profiles, however, were able to follow all alcohol brand pages and received an average of 362 advertisements within 30 days. The quantity of promotional updates increased throughout the week, reaching their peak on Thursday and Friday. Representatives/controllers of alcohol brand Instagram pages would respond directly to our underage user's comments. CONCLUSION The alcohol industry is in violation of their proposed self-regulation guidelines for digital marketing communications on Instagram. While Twitter's age-gate effectively blocked direct to phone updates, unhindered access to post was possible. Everyday our fictitious profiles, even those as young as 13, were bombarded with alcohol industry messages and promotional material directly to their smartphones.

[1]  Esther Thorson,et al.  Alcohol Advertising Exposure and Perceptions: Links with Alcohol Expectancies and Intentions to Drink or Drinking in Underaged Youth and Young Adults , 2004, Journal of health communication.

[2]  Peter Brimblecombe,et al.  Monitoring the future , 2010 .

[3]  R. Bonnie,et al.  Alcohol in the Media: Drinking Portrayals, Alcohol Advertising, and Alcohol Consumption Among Youth , 2004 .

[4]  Ellen Nolte,et al.  Exposure of Children and Adolescents to Alcohol Marketing on Social Media Websites , 2013, Alcohol and alcoholism.

[5]  D. Dobrota,et al.  In vitro assays for the evaluation of drug resistance in tumor cells , 2009, Clinical and Experimental Medicine.

[6]  D. McCaffrey,et al.  Does alcohol advertising promote adolescent drinking? Results from a longitudinal assessment. , 2005, Addiction.

[7]  P. Anderson.  Is it time to ban alcohol advertising? , 2009, Clinical medicine.

[8]  D. Jernigan.  Why South Africa's proposed advertising ban matters. , 2013, Addiction.

[9]  P. Rathouz,et al.  Alcohol advertising in magazines and adolescent readership. , 2003, JAMA.

[10]  M. Slater,et al.  Effects of alcohol advertising exposure on drinking among youth. , 2006, Archives of pediatrics & adolescent medicine.

[11]  S. Casswell.  Alcohol brands in young peoples' everyday lives: new developments in marketing. , 2004, Alcohol and alcoholism.

[12]  Kathryn Angus,et al.  Impact of alcohol advertising and media exposure on adolescent alcohol use: a systematic review of longitudinal studies. , 2009, Alcohol and alcoholism.

[13]  Elizabeth Waiters,et al.  Alcohol Advertising: What Makes It Attractive to Youth? , 2005, Journal of health communication.

[14]  Gabrielle Darville,et al.  Underage access to online alcohol marketing content: a YouTube case study. , 2015, Alcohol and alcoholism.

[15]  Patrick M. O'Malley,et al.  Monitoring the Future National Results on Adolescent Drug Use: Overview of Key Findings, 2004. , 2003 .

[16]  T. Babor,et al.  An empirical evaluation of the US Beer Institute's self-regulation code governing the content of beer advertising. , 2013, American journal of public health.

[17]  Ross Gordon,et al.  An audit of alcohol brand websites. , 2011, Drug and alcohol review.

[18]  G. Mooney,et al.  Prevention before profits: a levy on food and alcohol advertising , 2010, The Medical journal of Australia.

[19]  E. Austin,et al.  How does alcohol advertising influence underage drinking? The role of desirability, identification and skepticism. , 2006, The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine.

[20]  R. Ray,et al.  Global strategy to reduce the harmful use of alcohol , 2012 .

[21]  Craig S Ross,et al.  Evidence of underage targeting of alcohol advertising on television in the United States: Lessons from the Lockyer v. Reynolds decisions , 2014, Journal of public health policy.

[22]  C. Parry,et al.  Delays in South Africa's plans to ban alcohol advertising , 2014, The Lancet.

[23]  Craig S Ross,et al.  Youth Exposure to Alcohol Advertising on Television — 25 Markets, United States, 2010 , 2013, MMWR. Morbidity and mortality weekly report.

[24]  James Nicholls,et al.  Everyday, everywhere: alcohol marketing and social media--current trends. , 2012, Alcohol and alcoholism.

[25]  D. Foxcroft,et al.  The effect of alcohol advertising, marketing and portrayal on drinking behaviour in young people: systematic review of prospective cohort studies , 2009, BMC public health.

[26]  M. Rawlins.  Engaging with health-care policy , 2014, The Lancet.

[27]  K. Jackson,et al.  Cued recall of alcohol advertising on television and underage drinking behavior. , 2015, JAMA pediatrics.

[28]  Craig S Ross,et al.  Brand-specific consumption of alcohol among underage youth in the United States. , 2013, Alcoholism, clinical and experimental research.

[29]  Gary L. Kreps,et al.  Forty Years of Diffusion of Innovations: Utility and Value in Public Health , 2004, Journal of health communication.

[30]  Craig S Ross,et al.  Adolescent exposure to alcohol advertising in magazines: an evaluation of advertising placement in relation to underage youth readership. , 2009, The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine.

[31]  Clyde W. Dent,et al.  Exposure to Alcohol Advertisements and Teenage Alcohol-Related Problems , 2013, Pediatrics.

[32]  Thomas Babor,et al.  Assessment of self-regulatory code violations in Brazilian television beer advertisements. , 2010, Journal of studies on alcohol and drugs.

[33]  M. Stoolmiller,et al.  Alcohol marketing receptivity, marketing-specific cognitions, and underage binge drinking. , 2013, Alcoholism, clinical and experimental research.