A new study from Iowa State University finds Iowa teens are listening tosome public service messages aimed at keeping them away from drugs. Radioand T-V stations and newspapers run the announcements for free inconjunction with the Partnership for a Drug-Free Iowa. I-S-U journalismprofessor Lulu Rodriguez conducted a survey and focus groups to determinethe effectiveness of the P-S-A’s.She found a great deal of awareness of the campaign and says the surveyshows the campaign changed people’s attitudes toward drugs.Lulu says her focus groups showed attitudes against the norm among Iowayoung people. For example, it’s widely believed that teens get much of theirinformation from the Internet.She found that kids got most of their information from the radio while theywere driving or working. She says they also found that teens paid moreattention to spokespeople that looked like them and that were notcelebrities.Rodriguez has done surveys on the effectiveness of P-S-A’s for numerousgroups. She says most of the time the results show the message isn’t gettingthrough. Rodriguez says she expected the same thing when she began lookingat this campaign.A spokesman for the Partnership for a Drug-Free Iowa says the organizationpays 30-thousand dollars to make copies of the ads.
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