Social negative option marketing: A partial response to one of spotswood, French, tapp and stead’s (2012) “uncomfortable questions”

C. W. Von Bergen, Morgan P. Miles

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

10 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper was to address one of Spotswood et al.’s (2012) “uncomfortable questions”. The paper applies negative option marketing, the use of defaults as a behavioral engineering tool to shape choice, to social marketing and then uses the Hunt-Vitell (1986, 1993, 2006) Theory of Marketing Ethics to evaluate it against President Kennedy’s (1962) Consumer Bill of Rights and the American Marketing Association’s (2014) statement of marketing ethics. Design/methodology/approach – A conceptual assessment of the ethics of negative option social marketing (NOSM) using the Hunt-Vitell (1986, 1993, 2006) Theory of Marketing Ethics as the evaluative framework. 

Findings – When assessed using the Hunt-Vitell (1986, 1993, 2006) Theory of Marketing Ethics, NOSM possesses neither ethically sound means nor socially desirable ends. 

Originality/value – This paper contributes to the emerging debate on the use of nudges in a social marketing context and is a partial response to Spotswood et al. (2012).

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)125-138
Number of pages14
JournalJournal of Social Marketing
Volume5
Issue number2
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 13 Apr 2015

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