FDA to Study Risk/Benefit Perceptions in Animated DTC Ads

There has been a growing use of animation in prescription drug direct-to-consumer (DTC) advertising and promotional activities, and now FDA has decided to study whether such use minimizes risk or inflates efficacy perceptions. A just-posted agency notice seeks comments on the proposed research that is intended to answer:

       1. How does consumer processing of a DTC prescription drug ad differ depending on whether the ad is live-action, rotoscoped, or animated?

       2. Does consumer processing differ depending on whether the sufferer, the disease, or the benefit is the focus of the animation?

FDA says that whether a drug ad with animated human characters results in greater comprehension of product benefit and risk information than an ad with a human actor is unclear. “The few studies that have examined this technique in drug ads have found that animated human characters either had no effect on perceived product risk or led to poorer recognition of drug side effects,” it says.

The agency says that the majority of research on animated characters in advertising focuses on outcomes such as product evaluations, emotional responses, brand attitudes, and perceived product value. “The extent to which emotional responses can be fostered by animated characters is especially relevant to this study, as the positive effects these animations induce might transfer to the brands being advertised,” it says. “It is also possible that animated characters may lead to lower perceived risk by minimizing or camouflaging side effects.”

FDA says understanding how issues of animation and personification affect perceptions of both risks and benefits will be examined across two different medical conditions to see if the findings are consistent across patient populations and medications with different levels of risk. To test these research questions, FDA will conduct two experiments in two different medical conditions: chronic dry eye, and psoriasis.

“The first experiment will examine whether animation itself influences consumer processing, defined as consumer recall of risks and benefits, perceptions of risks and benefits, and attitudes and emotional responses to the ad, the brand, the product, and the character,” FDA says. “The second experiment will examine whether the object of the animation influences consumer processing of the ad..., defined as consumer recall of risks and benefits, perceptions of risks and benefits, and attitudes and emotional responses to the ad, the brand, the product, and the character. The animation will focus on the animated character who will personify either the sufferer of the medical condition, the disease itself, or the benefit from the drug.”

The proposed experiments are open for comments until 5/2.