Reference no: EM132303005 , Length: 4

Assignment -

Overview - Speeding is recognized globally as the most common contributing factor to both serious injuries and fatalities in road crashes. Young drivers are significantly more likely to be involved in road collisions than other road users, with excessive speed being the major cause of young adult fatalities. Attempts to address this issue using traditional advertising methods are repeatedly unsuccessful, as people tune out and become normalized to risk and fear appeals. Social marketers must think outside the box if they wish to effectively reach this age demographic with their campaigns to create safer roads for everyone. One technique explored recently in online anti-speeding campaigns is the use of memes. Memes are important communication tools as they can influence the behaviours of social groups on a wide scale, while spreading on a micro basis. Memes reproduce by various means of imitation, and it is extremely simple and low-cost to create a meme. As a social marketing tool, memes can be extremely impactful when compared to other means of communication. People intentionally seek out and enjoy memes. Whereas, most Australians do not take notice of advertisements on social media and intentionally tune out. Memes are particularly valuable for smaller organizations with limited resources seeking to make an impression online. Internet memes use humour to convey their message. Humour can be used as a means for gaining attention, and positively influences recall towards advertisement and educational claims.

Memes are distributed and shared through social media, and have the potential to go viral through online word-of-mouth. The 'millennial' age bracket, which incorporates 18 - 25 year- olds, are said to be a strong target audience for promotional content that use memes. Given the resonance of memes with young adults, and the often limited success of traditional communications campaigns used to modify young drivers' speeding attitudes and behaviours, there appears value in exploring the effectiveness of this non-traditional media within this context. The aim of this research then is to analyse the characteristics and interpretations of a meme that impact young drivers' attitudinal and behaviour responses to excessive driving speed. This study seeks to answer two research questions: (1) What characteristics and perceptions of a meme influence how it is evaluated, and (2) How do memes and other driver characteristics affect attitudinal and behavioural modification outcomes.

Data was collected from eighty-five undergraduate marketing students currently driving on Australian roads to understand how young adults evaluate memes, what makes a meme more likeable and memorable, and investigate whether the memes had an effect on attitudinal and behavioural driving responses. The researchers selected ten memes sourced from existing online anti-speeding campaigns posted by Australian state police force social media pages, which were modified to fit an Australian-wide context. Each student was randomly given two memes to assess from the pool of ten. The ten memes in the study are provided in the appendix.

The young drivers were asked to evaluate each meme on how easy it was to understand (Understand), whether they found the image humorous (Humorous), how trendy (Trendy) and original (Original) the meme is, and whether the features of the meme are suitable for a road safety campaign (Suitable). They were also asked how likable the image was (Like), and how easy to learn and remember is the message (Remember). Whether the meme influenced the respondent to be more conscious of their speed (Conscious) was asked to better understand attitude modification effects. Whether the image influenced the respondent to be less likely to speed while driving (Influence) was asked to better understand behaviour modification effects. Respondents were asked to indicate their agreement on a 7-point Likert-type scale where 1=strongly disagree and 7=strongly agree. Information also was provided on how long respondents had been driving on Australian roads, and whether they had ever exceeded the speed limit. The full question wording is provided in the SPSS data file under 'label'.

The researchers that collected the data have indicated a number of research questions they wish addressed in the final report. These are given below. They are also very interested in the implications of the findings for marketing and development of their meme communication campaign, and these should be included in the final report. The data for this assignment is titled 'MKTG2305 Group Project Dataset 2019.sav', and can be found on LMS. Values (as indicated above) and labels for the variables are provided within the data set.

Requirements - You are to address and answer each of the research questions. Your answer should be in the format of a written report detailing the main findings of the four research questions, including technical appendices. Details of the specific expectations for this format are outlined in the Appendix - Report Format.

Research Questions -

1. The researchers want to know which of the evaluation factors influence liking of the meme (Like), and how easy it is to learn and remember (Remember). The evaluation factors are understand, humorous, trendy, original and suitable. The analysis will need to consider all evaluation factors together, rather than individually. The researchers expect all evaluation factors to have a positive influence on liking and memorability.

2. The researchers want to understand which of the evaluation factors (understand, humorous, trendy, original and suitable) are rated highest across all memes. To do this use a statistical technique that will allow you to rank the evaluation factors on their mean performance level. If there are non-significant differences between the evaluation factors indicate these as being equal (tied) in the final ranking.

3. The researchers want to know whether driving experience (length of time respondent has driven on Australian roads) and past poor driving behaviour (exceeded the speed limit in the past) effects the ability of the meme to influence attitudinal (Conscious) and behaviour (Influence) modification change in respondent driving behaviour.

4. The researchers want to know whether there are differences in the ability of the individual memes to effect attitudinal (Conscious) and behaviour (Influence) modification change in respondent driving behaviour.

Note: For all group level analysis, the individual groups must contain at least 15 respondents. If relevant use the LSD (Least Significant Difference) post-hoc test to check inter-group differences.

Appendix - Report Format

Main Body of Report - The main body of your report should answer each of the research questions in non-technical language that managers, with little knowledge of statistics, can understand. Your written report should follow the structure outlined below.

1. Title page

2. Table of contents

3. Synopsis/executive summary

4. Introduction

5. Findings for research question one

6. Findings for research question two

7. Findings for research question three

8. Findings for research question four

9. Conclusion

10. Managerial/ marketing recommendations

You should include tables or graphs in the main body of the report to demonstrate the findings. These should not be directly cut and pasted from the SPSS statistical output, which is overly technical for the main body of the report.

Appendices

Any technical terms and more detailed presentation of results (if required) should be put in the appendices of the report. The appendices are included in the 25 page limit. Your appendices for each research question will need to provide information pertaining to:

1. The statistical procedure used.

2. The null and alternative hypotheses.

3. The test statistic and p-value used to reach a conclusion (test all hypotheses at the 5% significance level (i.e., 95% confidence level)).

4. Briefly comment on how well the assumptions are met (Note: you do not need to check for outliers and you are not required to conduct any formal normality tests as we have not covered this in lectures. However, you should check/comment on the other assumptions that are applicable to any given test).

Note - Need help with the 4th question of the case study there isn't a specified word count. The whole assignment just need to be under 25 pages and only need 4th question, approx 4 pages required for that.