Reconstructing Merck's Practical Theory of Communication: The Ethics of Pharmaceutical Sales Representative–Physician Encounters

This essay considers the ways in which Merck, a major pharmaceutical company, trained salespeople to communicate with physicians about its controversial pain drug, Vioxx. Between 2000 and 2004, approximately 60,000 people died while taking the drug. In this study, we analyzed 989 pages of internal training materials that show how Merck taught employees to communicate with physicians. Inspired by Craig and Tracy, we reconstruct the (1) guiding philosophies, (2) assumed problems, and (3) skills and techniques inherent in Merck's practical theory of communication. Using Nilsen's perspective on ethics, we argue that Merck taught a communication approach that obscured physicians' ability to make a significant choice and unnecessarily put more patients' lives at risk. The essay underscores the need to make communication ethics a primary rather than a secondary research concern.     

A Review of “Bite-Sized Marketing: Realistic Solutions for the Overworked Librarian” and “Building a Buzz: Libraries and Word-of-Mouth Marketing”

No abstract available for this article.     

In Defense of “Mass Communication” and Other Stuff

A consistent news frame that deligitmizes and depicts most social protests as "police vs. protesters" has been identified in studies of news coverage of social movements. This study used an experimental design to examine the extent to which photographs and prior attitudes toward protests and protesters in general contribute to previously identified framing effects of protest news. Results indicated that for the protest issue of interest evaluations of the protest and protesters were more negative when photos depicting higher levels of conflict were shown. The amount of conflict shown in the photos did not affect evaluations of the protest and protesters when the issue was of less interest to participants. Additionally, participants who had more positive prior attitudes toward protesting in general were more likely to identify with the protesters in the stimulus story and to perceive that the protest was more effective than were those with more negative prior attitudes. Findings suggest the need to address possible nuances associated with the visuals alone and to incorporate prior attitudes when examining effects of news coverage of protests.     

Point of Practice: Keeping “Health” in Health Communication Research and Practice

A review of my research in health communication leads to the presentation of eight insights that may be applied to the practice of health communication. The significance of collaboration and work in health communication practice settings, ranging from public health departments, to clinics, to participation in the Institute of Medicine guides the discussion of three broad principles that inform my health communication research. In both cases, a core emphasis is given to keeping “health” in health communication research and practice.     

Communication and problematic integration: Milan Kundera's “lost letters” in the book of laughter and forgetting

This essay uses the theory of problematic integration to analyze Milan Kundera's writing, particularly the central segment, entitled “Lost Letters,” in his first novel written as an emigre. The theory is concerned with the role of communication when desires and expectations diverge, or when we face ambiguity, ambivalence, or impossibility (i.e., when it is difficult to integrate evaluative and probabilistic orientations). Communication plays many significant roles in experiences with such difficulties. The essay reviews problematic integration theory and presents a case study of Kundera's writing designed to illuminate both the theory and a work by one of the most significant of modern novelists. The essay concludes by discussing the relevance of problematic integration theory to other approaches to the study of communication and by identifying questions for future communication research.     

The Dynamic Landscape of Marketing Children’s Books: Publishers Find Consistent Success Through a Combination of Online and Traditional Marketing to Adults and Children

There are a number of challenges unique to the children’s book sector faced by publishers in today’s digitally-dominant business market, making it more crucial than ever for children’s book marketers to create multifaceted marketing plans that include differing but complementary approaches. Among the common marketing challenges specific to children’s books are overabundance of content, competition, access to the library market, the digital versus print dichotomy, difficulty of marketing directly to young readers on the Internet, and the dual (child and adult) target audience. While some marketing tactics must effectively attract the attention of the child reader, it is of fundamental importance (with some exceptions) for publishers, authors, and marketers of children’s books to also ensure their marketing techniques target the adult gatekeepers who are likely to purchase those books. Depending upon various factors, including age range of the reader and subject matter, marketers of children’s books are most successful when applying a mix of traditional and digital marketing techniques.     

Reevaluating “The End of Mass Communication?”

It is hard to imagine a more challenging arena for communication research than that presented by new media and their impact on our society. We have witnessed the fastest evolution in communication technology in human history and, along with it, the evolution of communication conceptions and theories used to assess its impact. More than a decade has passed since Chaffee and Metzger first published their intriguing article “The End of Mass Communication?” and suggested that the new media will change the notions of mass communication and, as a result, the theories used in communication research. Today, we know more about new media and its effect on communication, society, and communication theories. The present article, therefore, sets out to reassess Chaffee and Metzger's claim by describing the development of several core theories of communication research, namely the agenda-setting theory and the notions of media audiences and the Digital Divide, in light of the new media. Our review shows that the role played by communication technologies in social, cultural, political, and economic processes is as central and influential in the new media era as it was in traditional media environment and that, although theories may change to accommodate the changes of the new media environment, researchers are still dealing with the “old” issues of power and resistance, and structure and ownership.     

The Family Environment of “Quick-Witted” Persons: Birth Order,Family Communication Patterns,and Creative Facility

“Creative facility” refers to the ease, rapidity, or fluency with which people are able to formulate and produce novel, appropriate messages. Previous research indicates that people differ in this regard and that the phenomenon is linked to various personality and cognitive-style variables. This study aims to investigate whether aspects of family structure (i.e., birth order) and family processes (i.e., family communication patterns) are related to creative facility. Results indicated a significant interaction between birth order and family conversation orientation such that, for first-borns, higher levels of conversation orientation were associated with slower message production. No effects were observed for family conformity orientation. Among the implications of the findings is the need to assess birth order in studies of family communication patterns.     

“Omega is a Four-Letter Word”: Toward a Tension-Centered Model of Resistance to Information and Communication Technologies

The adoption of enterprise-wide information and communication technologies (ICTs) has become a growing trend in a wide range of industries. Resistance has been identified as one of the most common reasons for unsuccessful implementations. Assuming technologies as fixed objects, many existing theories tend to reduce resistance to psychological mechanisms or structural misalignment. The purpose of this study is to retheorize resistance to ICTs by integrating a social constructionist perspective of technology and a framework of organizational tensions. By employing qualitative methods, a case study examined the adoption, implementation and use of an enterprise-wide software system in a technology service organization. The in-depth case analysis revealed a tension-centered process model, which shows that resistance to ICTs is constituted in a dynamic, reflexive interplay between the ongoing construction of ICTs and organizational tensions. In this process, an ICT adoption brings into play various organizational tensions, which then shape the interpretations of the ICT in oppositional terms, and reactions to these tensions and oppositional interpretations result in various forms of resistance behaviors. This tension-centered process model offers a useful alternative to existing research on resistance to ICTs in the workplace.     

“Communication,” “Critical”

Despite the proliferation of critical studies of communication, the meanings of the words “communication” and “critical” remain deeply contested. Attending to the history of the use of these terms inside and outside of the academy offers a broader perspective on some of the most pressing issues confronting scholars of communication today.     

Retrospective on Latin@ Rhetorical-Performance Scholarship: From “Chicano Communication” to “Latina/o Communication?”

This essay is a retrospective of Latina/o rhetorical and performance scholarship in which relevant themes and directions from the past 30 years are discerned. Identified are four periods beginning in a stage of recognition, progressing to integration, marked by a (re)turn and currently at re-politicalization. Within these periods two areas have been made explicit, namely, “Chicano communication” and “Latina/o communication” which I argue are parallel endeavors pursuing different yet complementary objectives that participate in reconstitution.