Alcohol brand placement on TV linked with teens' brand preferences and drinking behaviors

Product placement is when a particular product appears as part of a story, rather than in an ad outside the story. I have seen possible occurrences of it even in books.

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-04/aaop-abp042216.php

Public Release: 30-Apr-2016
Alcohol brand placement on TV linked with teens' brand preferences and drinking behaviors
Federal Trade Commission should keep better tabs on alcohol brand placement in TV and movies, say authors of study being presented at the Pediatric Academic Societies 2016 Meeting
American Academy of Pediatrics

While tobacco companies have not been allowed to buy product placement in television shows since 2000, alcohol brands continue to self-regulate their marketing in media. But a new research abstract to be presented at the Pediatric Academic Societies 2016 Meeting showing how strongly alcohol brand placement relates to the drinking behavior of underage youth suggests more regulation may be needed.

For the study, "Alcohol Brand Placement in Television Shows: A Content Coding Analysis and Comparison with Youth Brand Preference," researchers measured the alcohol-related content, including brand placements, of 10 popular televisions shows. They found an average of more than two alcohol brand placements per show episode, with some shows featuring more than 13 brand placements per episode. There was a variety of brands with a strong presence on the shows, but some were more prominent than others. Budweiser was far and away the most frequently occurring brand placement, representing 12 percent of all appearances, followed by Heineken (7 percent of all placements) and Dos Equis (6 percent of all placements).

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Youth who reported higher levels of watching TV shows with more prominent brand placement also reported higher levels of problematic drinking behavior, like binge drinking.

"Despite alcohol company reports in a 2012 Federal Trade Commission summary that they pay little for brand placement of their products, highly advertised brands appeared commonly in some TV shows popular with underage youth. This raises the question of whether companies are accurately reporting such payments to government regulators," said lead author Joy Gabrielli, PhD, a clinical child psychologist and postdoctoral research fellow at Dartmouth College & Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, who notes that television remains one of the most widely consumed media by youth in the United States.

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