The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) frequently studies consumer behavior, particularly as it relates to how members of the public (and medical professionals) understand pharmaceutical advertising. Our FDA Drug Advertising Study Tracker keeps tabs on these studies and explains what they're trying to accomplish in plain terms.   Date Topic Study Summary January 2012 Corrective Advertising Study to assess whether and how corrective advertising—used to cor...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced its plans to study whether consumers would benefit if direct-to-consumer television advertising contained a shorter list of major side effects instead of the now-lengthy list of nearly all of them. Background The study, first proposed in February 2014, is meant to address a regulatory hypothesis: That consumers, bombarded with a long list of side effects, might have a difficult time deciding between drugs. In the s...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced another proposed study of consumers who watch drug advertising on TV—the second this week—this time trying to assess how spouses influence how consumers understand a drug's benefits and risks. Background FDA frequently studies consumer behavior as it related to drug advertising. An overview of recent studies is as follows: Date Topic Study Summary January 2012 Corrective Advertising Study to assess wh...

There's no shortage of pharmaceutical advertising on US television stations. Watch a TV show for long enough, and chances are good you might even see the same drug ad several times. Now the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) says it's interested in studying whether consumers who view the same drug ad multiple times perceive the safety or efficacy of the advertised drug differently than those who view it only once. Background FDA frequently undertakes studies on direc...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has received approval to go forward with a proposed study to study the effects of "distractions" in direct-to-consumer drug advertising, which it hypothesizes may reduce consumers' ability to remember risk information about a product. Background FDA announced the proposed study in May 2014, saying that while "previous research has shown that factors such as multiple scene changes and music in advertising can be distracting," t...

How do teenagers and young adults interpret messages contained in direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical advertisements? The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) wants to know, and is now moving forward with a study of how adolescents and young adults (ages 13 to 30) understand the benefits and risks of drugs they learn about through advertising. The study was first announced in October 2013 . At the time, FDA noted that adolescents may understand drug advertisements ...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has put the finishing touches on a proposed eye-tracking study intended to assess how patients assess the benefits and risks of direct-to-consumer (DTC) drug advertising when subject to on-screen "distractions." FDA has conducted similar research in the past, it notes in its 27 May 2014 Federal Register announcement. Prior eye-tracking research determined that consumers understand drug risks better when they are simultaneously ...

Watch a drug advertisement in the US-any one, really-and one thing you're unlikely to hear any mention of is the drug's cost. That's not always an accident, as the myriad of insurance companies, co-pays, state insurance programs, private assistance programs, coupons and other incentives mean that the true cost of a drug is rarely seen by consumers and is rarely the same for two people. But assume, for a moment, that such an instance existed-that a drug ("Drug A") cost ...

In February 2014, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced that it wanted to revisit how it regulates the "major statement" of its drug advertisements, calling them potentially too long, leaving consumers more confused than informed. Now the pharmaceutical industry is weighing in on FDA's call for comments, supporting both its call for additional research and its goal of easing current requirements. Background At present, companies are required to present th...

Direct-to-consumer marketing is a topic of regular interest to regulators with the US Food and Drug Administration. At various times during the past several years, it has announced studies involving the use of composite scores in DTC advertising, the affect of DTC advertising on healthcare professionals , and corrective advertising resulting from improper DTC marketing. Now it's making some substantial changes to a DTC study first approved in 2011, according to docu...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced that it plans to move forward with a proposed study on direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising first announced in August 2012 regarding the use of composite scores in advertising and whether consumers have sufficient understanding to allow for their use. Background Composite scores are essentially a collection of clinical endpoints combined into a single overall score. For example, an allergy drug might use a comp...

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will move forward with a survey of healthcare professionals regarding their opinions and perceptions about prescription drug promotion after receiving approval from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), the executive branch's regulatory clearing house. Background FDA's intent to conduct the survey was first announced in January 2012, when it said in a Federal Register posting that it was soliciting comments on a propo...