Whose behavior is it anyway? The broader potential of social marketing

Social marketing has established itself as an effective technology for changing the health behaviors of individual citizens. However, people's behavior is not just determined by their own choices but also by their social context. An unhealthy diet, for instance, may result as much from poverty as poor food choice, and the continued use of tobacco from nicotine addiction rather than self-determination. Social marketing needs to address these "upstream" influences if it is to reach its full potential, as well as avoid intellectual and ethical criticism. These influences occur at two different levels: in the local community (e.g., diet may be determined by what is available in the local shops or exercising by access to sports facilities) -- "the immediate environment"; and in society as a whole (e.g., smoking may be encouraged if it is felt to have tacit endorsement from government) -- "the wider social context." In addition there are other influences on people's health outcomes, such as the addition of fluoride to water or folk acid to bread, that don't involve the individual in any action at all but do require behavior change by policy makers. Four case studies are used to show that social marketing can contribute at each of these levels, using the standard principles of consumer orientation, exchange and strategic planning

A Space of One's Own: Women's Magazine Consumption Within Family Life

This is a study of women's magazine consumption in the home. It explores issues of time and space, and addresses the importance the women who took part in the study place on magazine consumption in their lives, given the 'juggling' lifestyles experiences by most of them. The study reveals family life to be a landscape within which these women carve out what they perceive as valuable and rare time and space for themselves. The authors argue that in contemporary life women's magazines play a key part in the quest for me-time and time away from others, in both a tangible and experiential sense