Not always as advertised: Different effects from viewing safer gambling (harm prevention) adverts on gambling urges.

Public concern around gambling advertising in the UK has been met not by government action but by industry self-regulations, such as a forthcoming voluntary ban on front-of-shirt gambling sponsorship in Premier League soccer. "Safer gambling" (harm prevention) adverts are one recent example, and are TV commercials which inform viewers about gambling-related harm. The present work is the first independent evaluation of safer gambling adverts by both gambling operators and a charity called GambleAware. In an online experiment, we observed the change in participants' (N = 2,741) Gambling Urge Scale (GUS) scores after viewing either: a conventional financial inducement gambling advert, a gambling operator's safer gambling advert, an advert from the GambleAware "bet regret" campaign, an advert from the GambleAware "stigma reduction" campaign, or a control advert that was not about gambling. Relative to a neutral control advert, GUS scores increased after viewing a financial inducement or an operator's safer gambling advert. In comparison to the neutral control condition, GUS score changes were similar after viewing a bet regret advert, but showed a significant decrease after viewing a stigma reduction advert. Those at higher risk of harm reported larger decreases in GUS after watching a bet regret or stigma reduction advert. Overall, this study introduced a novel experimental paradigm for evaluating safer gambling adverts, uncovered a potential downside from gambling operators' safer gambling adverts, and revealed variation in the potential effectiveness of charity-delivered safer gambling adverts.

Narrative reversals and story success.

Storytelling is a powerful tool that connects us and shapes our understanding of the world. Theories of effective storytelling boast an intellectual history dating back millennia, highlighting the significance of narratives across civilizations. Yet, despite all this theorizing, empirically predicting what makes a story successful has remained elusive. We propose narrative reversals, key turning points in a story, as pivotal facets that predict story success. Drawing on narrative theory, we conceptualize reversals as plot: essential moments that push narratives forward and shape audience reception. Across 30,000 movies, TV shows, novels, and fundraising pitches, we use computational linguistics and trend detection analysis to develop a quantitative method for measuring narrative reversals via shifts in valence. We find that stories with more' and more dramatic, turning points are more successful. Our findings shed light on this age-old art form and provide a practical approach to understanding and predicting the impact of storytelling.

Impact of using a centralized matching process on nursing home staffing.

OBJECTIVE: To examine the effectiveness of adopting a novel centralized matching process for reducing staff shortages in Massachusetts nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: This study involved several datasets and 216 Massachusetts nursing homes that used a novel online portal to enter demand for nursing staff from May 2020 to April 2021. RESULTS: There were significant associations between the staff-to-resident ratio and demand entries lagged by three and four weeks, and no significant associations between the staff-to-resident ratio and demand entries lagged by one and two weeks. In contrast, we found significant associations between the staff-to-resident ratio and the number of generated staff matches lagged by one, two and three weeks, with larger impacts overall. CONCLUSION: This study shows how adopting a centralized matching process may expedite and increase improvement in the staff-to-resident ratio in nursing homes, compared with the setup in which nursing homes need to seek nurses on their own.

How consumer digital signals are reshaping the customer journey.

Marketers are adopting increasingly sophisticated ways to engage with customers throughout their journeys. We extend prior perspectives on the customer journey by introducing the role of digital signals that consumers emit throughout their activities. We argue that the ability to detect and act on consumer digital signals is a source of competitive advantage for firms. Technology enables firms to collect, interpret, and act on these signals to better manage the customer journey. While some consumers' desire for privacy can restrict the opportunities technology provides marketers, other consumers' desire for personalization can encourage the use of technology to inform marketing efforts. We posit that this difference in consumers' willingness to emit observable signals may hinge on the strength of their relationship with the firm. We next discuss factors that may shift consumer preferences and consequently affect the technology-enabled opportunities available to firms. We conclude with a research agenda that focuses on consumers, firms, and regulators.