Objectives/Rationale: To describe the tobacco industry's corporate social responsibility initiatives and assess their implications for tobacco control, and to analyze the impact of these initiatives on media framing of the industry and smoking behavior. Tobacco use is the most important single preventable cause of death and disease in the U.S., increasing risks for lung and other cancers and other serious illnesses. Considerable evidence suggests that in addition to individual behavior change, interventions to prevent tobacco related cancers must focus on changing the cultural and policy contexts of tobacco use. Industry delegitimization and isolation strategies, including media campaigns, have contributed to building a nationwide grassroots movement against tobacco use and countering industry efforts to derail local smokefree policies, which have been shown to be effective in reducing tobacco use. However, the ongoing effectiveness of such approaches may be jeopardized by the tobacco industry's recent, aggressively-promoted corporatesocial responsibility initiatives.
Specific Aims : #1) Retrieve and analyze tobacco industry documents in order to describe tobacco industry efforts to: a) use corporate social responsibility initiatives for public relations and marketing purposes; b) sustain and increase the social acceptability of smoking; c) use corporate social responsibility initiatives to influence tobacco control policymaking; d) position corporate social responsibility initiatives as a defense against litigation; e) establish itself as a source of health information; f) create alliances with public health groups, both tobacco- and non-tobacco-related; g) sow divisions within the tobacco control movement; and h) undermine tobacco control efforts that focus on smoking denormalization and tobacco industry delegitimization. #2): Assess the influence of tobacco industry corporate social responsibility initiatives on media framing of a) the tobacco industry and b) smoking behavior. This descriptive project will utilize archival research and content and frames analyses.This innovative study of tobacco industry corporate social responsibility efforts will provide new knowledge essential for formulating proactive public health responses to these industry initiatives, and contribute to theoretical understandings of framing in relation to public health issues. In addition, it will enhance understanding of the industry's role in promoting the social acceptability of smoking.
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