Exposure to televised political campaign advertisements aired in the United States 2015-2016 election cycle and psychological distress.

CONTEXT: Prior research suggests the potential for political campaign advertisements to increase psychological distress among viewers. The current study tests relationships between estimated exposure to campaign advertising and the odds of respondents reporting that a doctor told them they have anxiety, depression, insomnia, or (as a negative control) cancer. METHODS: A secondary analysis of U.S. data on televised campaign ad airings from January 2015 to November 2016 (n = 4,659,038 airings) and five waves of a mail survey on television viewing patterns and self-reported medical conditions from November 2015 to March 2017 (n = 28,199 respondents from n = 16,204 unique households in the U.S.). FINDINGS: A 1 percent increase in the estimated volume of campaign advertising exposure was associated with a 0.06 [95% CI 0.03-0.09] percentage point increase in the odds of a respondent being told by a doctor that they have anxiety in the past 12 months. We observed this association regardless of the political party of the ad sponsor, the political party of the respondent, or their statistical interaction. We also observed this association for both Presidential campaign ads and non-Presidential (including local, state, and U.S. congressional election) campaign ads, providing evidence that these relationships were not driven by the unique divisiveness of the race between Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton. Some topic-specific models offered additional evidence of association between estimated volume of campaign advertising exposure and the odds of being told by a doctor that they have depression or insomnia, but these patterns were less consistent across models that utilized different categories of campaign exposure. Campaign ad exposure was not associated with cancer, which served as a negative control comparison. CONCLUSIONS: There was a consistent positive association between the volume of campaign advertising exposure and a reported diagnosis of anxiety among American adults.

Estimated televised alcohol advertising exposure in the past year and associations with past 30-day drinking behavior among American adults: results from a secondary analysis of large-scale advertising and survey data.

AIMS: To estimate the volume of past-year televised alcohol advertising exposure by product category and demographic group among adults living in the United States and test associations between estimated alcohol advertising exposure and past 30-day drinking behavior. DESIGN: Secondary analysis of data from two national-level US data sets: Kantar data on appearances of televised alcohol advertisements and data from the Simmons National Consumer Survey (NCS), a large national mail survey on television viewing patterns and consumer behavior. SETTING: United States. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 54 671 adults, aged 21 years and older, who were randomly selected to participate in the Simmons NCS. MEASUREMENTS: Estimated exposure to televised advertisements for beer, wine and spirits, self-reported alcohol use in the past year and number of drinks consumed in the past 30 days. FINDINGS: The average respondent was exposed to an estimated 576 [95% confidence interval (CI) = 570-582] televised alcohol advertisements in the year preceding their survey. Exposure was higher among males versus females and African Americans versus whites. A 1% increase in the estimated volume of advertisement exposure was associated with a 0.11 (95% CI = 0.08-0.13) percentage point increase in the odds of having at least one drink in the last 30 days and, among past 30-day drinkers, a 0.05 (95% CI = 0.04-0.07) per cent increase in the number of alcoholic drinks consumed. Associations were consistent across product categories and demographics. CONCLUSIONS: There appears to be a small but consistent positive association between alcohol advertising exposure and drinking behavior among American adults.