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CHAPTER ONE THE FOOLSSPEED CAMPAIGN FINAL PHASE
1.1 Introduction
1.1 This report evaluates the final advertising phase of the Road Safety Scotland Foolsspeed initiative, focusing on the 'Doppelganger' television advert and its perceived impact within, and relationship to, the wider Foolsspeed campaign. It also provides a retrospective of the campaign as a whole and discusses issues involved in using the Theory of Planned Behaviour as a model on which to base road safety campaigns.
1.2 Foolsspeed
1.2 'Foolsspeed' was a five-year campaign by Road Safety Scotland (formerly the Scottish Road Safety Campaign) designed to reduce the use of inappropriate and excessive speed on Scotland's roads. The campaign was targeted at the general driving population in Scotland. However, a key sub-group for the campaign was drivers with a known tendency to speed, particularly 25-44 year old males in social classes ABC1.
1.3 A major component of the campaign was a focused and structured mass media campaign underpinned by the Theory of Planned Behaviour ( TPB) (Ajzen, 1988), a model which explains and predicts behaviour in terms of key psychological determinants. More detailed information on the TPB and its use in Foolsspeed is provided in the report on the earlier stages of the campaign (Stead et al, 2002). The TPB was used to shape a series of television advertisements, each designed to address a key determinant of behavioural intention according to the TPB: Attitudes, Subjective Norms and Perceived Behavioural Control. In November 1998 a series of six 10-second television advertisements introduced the campaign logo and key messages. These were accompanied by publicity materials and unpaid publicity activity to create widespread exposure to the campaign logo, thereby reinforcing the television advertising. The 2 nd phase of the campaign in 1999 comprised a 40-second television advertisement, "Mirror", designed to address Attitudes regarding speeding and speed choice. The 3 rd phase of the campaign, in 2000, comprised a 40-second television advertisement, "Friends and Family", which was designed to address Subjective Norms in relation to speeding. A 4 th phase in 2001 featured a television advertisement, "Simon Says", designed to address the third main component of TPB, Perceived Behavioural Control. The ads are described in more detail below.
The 1999 "Mirror" Advert: Attitudes
The first advert was designed to address the attitudes component of the Theory of Planned Behaviour. It sought to challenge the beliefs that speeding in town saves time, that a speeding driver is fully in control of the car, and that he or she is able to stop quickly in an emergency if necessary. Beliefs about inappropriate speed and speeding were challenged by demonstrating that 30mph, although the legal speed limit, may be too fast in certain circumstances. The advertisement also sought to challenge the more general belief 'I'm a better driver than most'. It features a male driver in his 30's driving in an urban residential environment. The driver's conscience or alter ego appears in the rear-view mirror and points out the foolishness of urban speeding by noting that a car from which the driver previously raced away has caught up with him at the traffic lights. As the driver nears a school, the conscience argues about the appropriateness of his speed, to which the driver retorts that he 'is a better driver than most' (the implication being that he can therefore handle speed safely). The driver's attention is momentarily distracted by a young woman walking along the pavement with a small child, and when he looks back at the road he is shocked to realise that the car in front has stopped at a school crossing. The driver comes to a noisy halt, and the conscience shakes his head in the mirror. The strapline reads 'Take a good look at yourself when you're driving'.
The 2000 "Friends and Family" Advert: Subjective Norms
The second advert was designed to address the subjective norms component of the Theory of Planned Behaviour. This concerns drivers' perceptions of how much significant others in their lives would approve or disapprove of their speeding, combined with their level of motivation to drive in a way that would meet the approval of these significant others. The advertisement sought to highlight the possible mismatch between a driver's own view of his or her behaviour and how it is seen by passengers, and to illustrate to drivers the possible concern, irritation and anxiety that significant others may feel about their driving. The driver featured in the advertisement is again a male in his 30's, while the significant others are a female spouse/partner and a male friend/work colleague. A baby is also present in the advert, in a child seat in the back of the car. The advertisement begins with the female partner, at home, describing how her partner becomes 'a different person, totally unrecognisable'. The family are then shown in the car, with the driver speeding and his partner protesting as the speed of the car jolts the baby's neck. She says she wishes her partner could see things through her eyes. A male friend/colleague of the driver then addresses the camera, also expressing his disapproval of his friend's speeding. The two friends are shown in the car, with the driver again speeding. The friend spills juice down his sweater when the driver accelerates to race another car away from the lights, and expresses annoyance. The advertisement closes by showing the driver alone in the car, to the voice-over 'Put yourself in the passenger seat. If you don't, others won't'.
The 2001 "Simon Says" Advert: Perceived Behavioural Control
The third advertisement of the campaign was designed to address perceived behavioural control - that is, drivers' perceptions of how easy or difficult it is to increase their control over their speeding. This was possibly the most difficult of the TPB components to translate into advertising. The creative brief for the advertising postulated that the advertisement should seek to challenge drivers with the sentiment 'you're responsible for the way you drive', by depicting typical internal and external pressures which encourage drivers to speed and demonstrating that it is possible and desirable to withstand such pressures. Three different drivers and driving scenarios are depicted, illustrating the pressure of being in a flow of traffic going at 40mph in a 30mph limit, the pressure of being late for work, and the more direct pressure of an impatient driver (a 'white van man') behind. In the latter scenario, the driver nearly hits a cyclist as a result of being distracted and pressurised by the white van driver. The ad closes with the strapline 'Be your own man'.
1.4 During development, each advertisement went through a phase of consumer research to evaluate its communication potential and to provide guidance on aspects of execution. The consumer research at each stage involved a series of eight single sex focus groups with drivers aged 17-54. The samples slightly over-represented male drivers, drivers aged 25-44 and drivers from social classes ABC1, since these groups represented the campaign's core target audience, although women and social class C2DE respondents were also included. To maximise its value, the consumer research was conducted at the pre-production stage using storyboards and narrative tape to convey the intended advertising. The research proved useful for guiding characterisation and storylines, and for optimising delivery of the intended messages (Eadie & Stead, 1998; Stead & Eadie, 2000; Stead & Eadie, 2001).
1.5 A major evaluation, comprising a longitudinal 4-year cohort study, was conducted to evaluate the impact of the campaign in terms both of communication objectives (were the ads memorable, engaging and so on?) and of Theory of Planned Behaviour objectives (did each ad trigger changes in the particular TPB determinant targeted, and how did any changes in these determinants relate to intentions and behaviour?). Results from this evaluation have been previously published as a Social Research report (Stead et al, 2002).
1.3 The final 'Doppelganger' advert
1.6 In 2004 a final Foolsspeed advert was developed, focusing on the positive benefits of calmer driving.
The 2004 "Doppelganger" Advert: Positive Affective Beliefs
The 'Doppelganger' advert, in keeping with the realistic approach to everyday driving, contained no accidents or crashes. Instead, it focused on the journey to work of a man and his doppelganger. We see the attitudes and behaviours of the 'two' drivers as they undertake the journey to the office. One character drives calmly and without incident, arriving at his work in a relaxed state, finding a car parking space and getting a cup of coffee. The second character is impatient, takes unnecessary chances (although he is not involved in any incident as such) and ends up being reprimanded by the police at the side of the road. Consequently he arrives at the office stressed and frustrated, and unable to find a parking space, while his doppelganger observes him through the window, calmly sipping on his coffee
The rationale behind the development of Doppelganger was that it tapped into 'affective beliefs' about speeding. Positive and negative affective beliefs are sometimes included in the extended TPB, and refer to beliefs about the emotions one might experience while performing a behaviour (for example, feeling pleasure, feeling remorse). An affective beliefs ad had not formed part of the original Foolsspeed campaign strategy, but was subsequently included because the earlier evaluation suggested that the addition of affective beliefs may improve the predictive ability of the model and have some potential value in a speeding campaign (Stead et al, 2002).
1.7 The 'Doppelganger' advert was aired at a low level, running for a 9 week period from 8 th November - 16 th January on channels Four and Five (and not on ITV). Omnibus research was conducted in January 2005 to track awareness of this advert among the general public, this showed that:
- Similar to the previous wave (2004), 58% of respondents said they had seen advertising about speeding recently.
- Regular drivers were slightly more likely to recall having seen advertising about speeding (62%).
- Only 5% of respondents identified that the name for the campaign was Foolsspeed.
1.8 The 'Doppelganger' ad was re-run across Scotland between the 3 rd October and the 18 th December 2005. It was shown on ITV, C4 and C5, focusing on programming targeted towards men in the 25-44 year old category. There was a 3 week burst of heavy weight activity to kick-start the campaign followed by week on/week off pulse activity for the remainder of the campaign.
1.4 Aim and objectives of the research
1.9 The overall aim of this research was to evaluate the 'Doppelganger' advert within the context of the Foolsspeed campaign and the Theory of Planned Behaviour.
1.10 The study had the following specific research objectives:
- To explore unprompted and prompted recall of the 'Doppelganger' advert and the Foolsspeed Campaign
- To explore unprompted and prompted reactions to the campaign (eg. the extent to which drivers identified with the advert and whether there were differences in identification between different types of drivers; whether the advert was understood, credible, relevant and motivating; the extent to which the advert encouraged drivers to reflect on and critically appraise their own driving, and whether speeders were more or less likely to experience this kind of dissonance than non-speeders).
- To explore the extent to which the Doppelganger advert linked with and supported the previous Foolsspeed adverts, in terms of message coherence, thematic progression and mutual reinforcement (what connections did drivers draw between Doppelganger and previous Foolsspeed advertisements, and what effect did these connections have on message understanding? To what extent did the underpinning theme of the Doppelganger advert link with and reinforce the Theory of Planned Behaviour underpinning of the first three adverts?).
- To explore retrospectively reactions to the Foolsspeed campaign as a whole, including perceptions of the campaign's credibility and impact and the appropriateness of the overall campaign style (ie. the avoidance of graphic portrayals of accidents).
- To identify further areas in which the campaign approach could be developed.
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