24762 Chap.7 Research in Social Marketing
Research in Social Marketing
Eyes and ears
Research is central to social marketing and runs through every stage, from problem definition and formative research to pretesting, implementation, evaluation and feedback.
Ways of knowing
The lecture introduces paradigms, ontology and four epistemologies, positivism, interpretivism, critical theory and pragmatism, and suggests social marketing research is multi-paradigmatic and pragmatic.
Methods and ethics
Depth interviews, focus groups, ethnography, netnography, surveys and experiments each answer different questions, and Diener and Crandall’s four ethical areas frame what participants are owed.
For the tasks
The workshop asks you to do your own desk research for the case study video, to think carefully about what research an Indigenous led programme would need for the poster, and to name your research skills in the personal statement.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Research at every stage of a programme
- 02
Action research
- 03
Paradigms and ontology
- 04
Four epistemologies
- 05
Research ethics
- 06
Exploratory, conclusive and mixed designs
- 07
Combining methods: the glass onion
Worked example · free
Design the research for a water-saving programme
- 1Scoping: secondary data on household use by suburb, to find where watering is highest.
- 1Formative: depth interviews and garden observation, to learn why people water and when.
- 1Pretesting: show draft messages and a free soil-moisture sensor offer to a small group.
- 1Evaluation: compare metered use with the baseline and interview a sample about their experience.
Key terms
- Formative Research
- Research before a programme is designed that finds out what moves and motivates the audience.
- Epistemology
- The branch of philosophy about the nature and scope of knowledge: how we know what we know.
- Netnography
- Ethnography of online behaviour in forums and social media, faster and cheaper but with less depth.
Research in Social Marketing FAQ
Why does the lecture call research social marketing’s eyes and ears?
Because everything a social marketer does has to be guided by an understanding of the people it hopes to influence. The lecture places research at every stage, from problem definition through formative research and pretesting to implementation, evaluation and feedback into the next round.
What are the four epistemologies in the lecture?
Positivism, which treats everything as measurable; interpretivism, which sees reality as socially constructed; critical theory, which exposes forces that restrict freedom; and pragmatism, which draws theory from practice and fits mixed methods to the issue.
What ethical issues matter most in social marketing research?
Diener and Crandall name harm to participants, lack of informed consent, invasion of privacy and deception. Social marketing topics are often sensitive or even illegal, so consent, confidentiality, de-identification and data protection need careful planning.
How does research help the poster and statement?
The workshop asks you to consider what research an Indigenous led, co-designed programme would need and how and why it would be done, and to name your research skills in the personal statement.
What is the difference between exploratory and conclusive research?
Exploratory designs, such as depth interviews, ethnography or case studies, suit ill-defined problems and generate hypotheses, usually qualitatively. Conclusive designs, such as surveys, cohort studies and randomised trials, verify hypotheses and aim to generalise. Mixed methods triangulate the two.
Why combine methods in formative research?
Self-report alone can mislead because of social desirability bias. In the Carins reading, observation of 630 Army diners showed people choosing more of the least healthy dishes than the healthiest, which interviews and surveys on their own could have missed.
What does action research mean here?
Lewin described it as inquiry carried out by, and for, the people taking action. The lecture uses it to say that the goal of social marketing research is behaviour and social change, so every study should feed a decision about what the programme will do next.
Assessment move
List the research your Assessment 1 problem already has and the research it lacks, then decide which stage of the cycle the gap belongs to. Practise one sentence for each epistemology in your own words, and learn the four ethical areas, because a plan that collects community data without addressing them will lose marks on the poster.
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