Digging deeper on diversity and inclusion in Advertising research: a call to action

Abstract

i recently had the pleasure of participating in a special session at the american academy of advertising’s annual conference along with Kathrynn Pounders, Sukki Yoon, Minette drumwright, Brittany Pharr, Carrie laFerle, and Eric Haley on diversity, Equity, and inclusion in the marketplace. i was very pleased to report that papers on a variety of diversity and inclusion topics are being published in iJa at a higher rate than has been the case in the past (e.g. Kordrostami and laczniak 2022; li 2022; Phillips 2022; Mueller et al. 2023; thomas, Johnson, and Grier (2023). For an overview of research in this area and some general guidance on effective research practice, i would direct the reader to Eisend, Muldrow and rosengren (2023), who note gender, ethnicity/race, sexual orientation, and age have been the most widely researched topics. these authors call for more research on these groups and also note that other diversity attributed, including disabilities, gender identity and religion are in need of more study. an important point made is that diverse and inclusive advertising has been shown to have the ability to produce favorable brand and societal effects. While more high quality papers are indeed being submitted and accepted on diversity and inclusion topics in iJa, from an editorial perspective there are some common caveats with some submissions on these topics. First, some submissions spend to much space in the manuscript, recapping history and results that have already been documented in other academic papers. reviewers generally look for new contributions, so studies should focus on understanding a phenomenon at a deeper level than has been the case in the past. Second, some papers contain one-sided arguments, ignoring academic studies that might show some level of progress in terms of diversity and inclusion. if it has occurred it is good to acknowledge progress while focusing on what is still problematic or needs to happen for further progress to be made. third, political statements and bias should be avoided. Some papers, across a spectrum of political viewpoints, have had reviewers question the objectivity of a study, which is absolutely crucial to academic research. Notably, objectivity is apparently highly valued by a large majority of reviewers. Finally, some submissions on diversity and inclusion get criticized for not drawing realistic and actionable conclusions. While scholars obviously generally do not put forth ads, studies that show a path to more effective ads or corporate social responsibility perceptions usually have useful, helpful implications. in summary, as is the case with the papers previously cited here, research should delve deeper into existing and new issues. there are a few areas i would spotlight as especially being in need of additional research. First are experimental studies of advertising featuring various types of portrayals of minority groups and reaction of both the same minority and other groups both in terms of stereotypes and ad effectiveness. Second, latino/ Hispanic underrepresentation in U.S. ads has now been present for years and has not been adequately studied or explained beyond descriptive content analyses—additional methods are needed. third, with only 40% of incoming college freshmen being male https://doi.org/10.1080/02650487.2023.2202073