Sheehan, Tsao and Pokrywczynski (2012)

Source Details

Sheehan, Tsao and Pokrywczynski (2012)
Title:	Stop the music! How advertising can help stop college students from downloading music illegally
Author(s):	Sheehan, B., Tsao, J., Pokrywczynski, J.
Year:	2012
Citation:	Sheehan, B., Tsao, J., & Pokrywczynski, J. (2012). Stop the Music: How Advertising Can Help Stop College Students from Downloading Music Illegally. Journal of Advertising Research, 52, 309-321.
Link(s):	Definitive
Key Related Studies:	Chiou, Huang and Lee (2005) Ingram and Hinduja (2008) Hennig-Thurau, Henning and Sattler (2007) Pfanner (2010)
Discipline:	K42: Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
Linked by:

About the Data
Data Description:	The study was broken into four phases: The first phase was an exploratory/qualitative phase, completed in January 2009. The research was conducted at a large eastern university. Sixteen students participated in four small focus groups; 15 individuals participated in in-depth interviews.Twenty-two participants were undergraduates, and nine were graduate students. They ranged in age from 18 to 27. The majority of subjects were Caucasian; there were two Hispanics, one Asian-American, and one African American. The second phase was a quantitative phase, completed in June 2009 (Sheehan, Tsao, and Yang, 2010). A convenience sample of 204 college students from a large eastern university participated in an anonymous survey. Respondents were recruited from four undergraduate classes and one graduate class. The questionnaire included 59 questions related to the authors’ previous qualitative study of this subject. The third phase, completed in March 2010, was an experimental phase entailing advertising-concept testing. Phase III included 415 participants from two universities; 48 percent of the sample came from a large eastern university, and 52 percent came from a mid-sized mid-western university. Twenty-nine percent of the respondents were male and 71 percent female. Participants were randomly divided into 10 groups: eight experimental groups - each evaluating a separate concept - one generic group, and one control group. The fourth phase, completed in December 2010, was an experimental stage. Two advertising campaigns were developed: the first campaign focused on the potential cost of ruining your computer based on catching a virus and ran at a mid-sized midwestern university, and the second focused on the risk that illegal downloading could affect your ability to get a job once you graduate from school, and ran at a large eastern university. The campaigns ran at significant weight levels on both campuses. After the last advertisements ran in student media, students on each campus were randomly sampled using a short question-naire. Campaign 1 was tested against 151 participants: 43 percent of the respondents were male, 57 percent female. Campaign 2 was tested against 462 participants: 32 percent of the respondents were male, 68 percent female.
Data Type:	Primary data
Secondary Data Sources:
Data Collection Methods:	Quantitative Collection Methods Experimental (Field) Qualitative Collection Methods Survey Research (qualitative; e.g. consumer preferences) Semi-Structured Interview Focus Groups
Data Analysis Methods:	Regression Analysis
Industry(ies):	Sound recording and music publishing
Country(ies):	United States
Cross Country Study?:	No
Comparative Study?:	No
Literature review?:	No
Government or policy study?:	No
Time Period(s) of Collection:	January 2009, June 2009, March 2010 and December 2010.
Funder(s):

Abstract

Digital-music piracy takes a heavy toll on the music industry and the U.S. economy. Losses are measured in the tens of billions of dollars. college students especially are problematic, downloading more than 1 billion illegal songs per year. This paper reports on a four-phase research project. Phases I and II mapped specific motivations for the behavior and attendant reinforcements and costs. Phase III tested a variety of advertising concept statements intended to reverse the behavior. Phase Iv was an in-market survey of advertising campaigns across two college campuses. Two campaigns were significantly effective in reversing music piracy among college students.

Main Results of the Study

The main results reported in this study:

• Research at both universities confirmed a strong correlation between past behavior and anticipated/perceived future behavior.

As a whole, the group that had downloaded music frequently each month would anticipate to continue, in general, to do so despite the advertising campaign messages.

Despite this finding, nonetheless, the two campaigns did show signs of effectiveness:

• Campaign 1 - “Viruses” - showed a somewhat significant correlation between perceptually decreased use of illegal programs and those who found the advertising convincing (this represented 12.8 percent of the sample population).

• Campaign 1 was also found to have a somewhat significant correlation between decreased use of illegal programs and those who found the advertising persuasive (this represented 13.5 percent of respondents based on top three box scores).

• Campaign 1 can be judged to be somewhat successful in changing the anticipated behavior of 12.8 percent of the college population.

• Campaign 2 - “Getting a Good Job” - showed a highly significant correlation between both the perceptually increased use of legal programs and the perceptually decreased use of illegal programs and those who found the advertising convincing (this represented 19.1 percent of the population for increased use of legal programs and 15.3 percent of the sample population for decreased use of illegal programs).

• Campaign 2 was also found to have a significant correlation between both the increased use of legal programs and the decreased use of illegal programs and those who found the advertising persuasive (this represented 12.1 percent of respondents based on top 3 box scores).

• Campaign 2 can be judged to be highly successful in changing the anticipated downloading behavior of at least 15.3 percent to 19.1 percent of the college population.

• Importantly, these numbers are not mutually exclusive; therefore, the total percentage of college students increasing their use of legal programs and/or decreasing their use of illegal programs is higher than 19.1 percent (perhaps significantly so), although the research team was not able to measure it exactly.

Policy Implications as Stated By Author

Policy implications reported in the study:

• The authors believe the total percentage of college students increasing their use of legal programs and/or decreasing their use of illegal programs to be significant, with the potential to lead to tens of millions of dollars in recaptured revenue for the music industry and, per- haps, more for the overall U.S. economy.

Coverage of Study

Coverage of Fundamental Issues

Issue	Included within Study
Relationship between protection (subject matter/term/scope) and supply/economic development/growth/welfare
Relationship between creative process and protection - what motivates creators (e.g. attribution; control; remuneration; time allocation)?
Harmony of interest assumption between authors and publishers (creators and producers/investors)
Effects of protection on industry structure (e.g. oligopolies; competition; economics of superstars; business models; technology adoption)
Understanding consumption/use (e.g. determinants of unlawful behaviour; user-generated content; social media)

Coverage of Evidence Based Policies

Issue	Included within Study
Nature and Scope of exclusive rights (hyperlinking/browsing; reproduction right)
Exceptions (distinguish innovation and public policy purposes; open-ended/closed list; commercial/non-commercial distinction)
Mass digitisation/orphan works (non-use; extended collective licensing)
Licensing and Business models (collecting societies; meta data; exchanges/hubs; windowing; crossborder availability)
Fair remuneration (levies; copyright contracts)
Enforcement (quantifying infringement; criminal sanctions; intermediary liability; graduated response; litigation and court data; commercial/non-commercial distinction; education and awareness)

Datasets

Sample size:	16
Level of aggregation:	University students
Period of material under study:	January 2009

Sample size:	15
Level of aggregation:	University students
Period of material under study:	January 2009

Sample size:	204
Level of aggregation:	University students
Period of material under study:	June 2009

Sample size:	415
Level of aggregation:	University students
Period of material under study:	March 2010

Sample size:	151
Level of aggregation:	University students
Period of material under study:	December 2010

Sample size:	462
Level of aggregation:	University students
Period of material under study:	December 2010