IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/indorg/v31y2013i2p181-194.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Informing the uninformed: How drug advertising affects check-up visits

Author

Listed:
  • Hosken, Daniel
  • Wendling, Brett

Abstract

Direct-to-consumer drug advertising has recently become an important and controversial component of drug marketing. In this paper we examine one of the claimed benefits of drug advertising: encouraging the undiagnosed to seek out medical treatment. We measure how advertising affects an undiagnosed individual's decision to visit a physician for a check-up using detailed person-level panel data on more than 30,000 individuals from the Medical Care Expenditure Panel Survey. We find drug advertising is an important determinant of an individual's decision to get a check-up and that this effect of drug advertising appears to differ by demographic group. While the differences between demographic groups are not statistically different, our point estimates suggest that Blacks and the highly educated are the most responsive to drug advertising.

Suggested Citation

  • Hosken, Daniel & Wendling, Brett, 2013. "Informing the uninformed: How drug advertising affects check-up visits," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 181-194.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:indorg:v:31:y:2013:i:2:p:181-194
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijindorg.2010.11.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167718710001396
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ijindorg.2010.11.006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Davina C. Ling & Ernst R. Berndt & Margaret K. Kyle, 2002. "Deregulating Direct-to-Consumer Marketing of Prescription Drugs: Effects on Prescription and Over-the-Counter Product Sales," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 45(S2), pages 691-723.
    2. David Reiffen, 2007. "The Effect Of Group Size And Asymmetries On The Incentive To Reveal Group‐Specific Information," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(4), pages 739-769, December.
    3. Gregory S. Crawford & Matthew Shum, 2005. "Uncertainty and Learning in Pharmaceutical Demand," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 73(4), pages 1137-1173, July.
    4. Pauline M. Ippolito & Alan D. Mathios, 1990. "Information, Advertising and Health Choices: A Study of the Cereal Market," RAND Journal of Economics, The RAND Corporation, vol. 21(3), pages 459-480, Autumn.
    5. Gary Chamberlain, 1980. "Analysis of Covariance with Qualitative Data," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 47(1), pages 225-238.
    6. Toshiaki Iizuka, 2004. "What Explains the Use of Direct‐to‐Consumer Advertising of Prescription Drugs?," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(3), pages 349-379, September.
    7. Chaloupka, Frank J. & Warner, Kenneth E., 2000. "The economics of smoking," Handbook of Health Economics, in: A. J. Culyer & J. P. Newhouse (ed.), Handbook of Health Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 29, pages 1539-1627, Elsevier.
    8. Janet Currie & Enrico Moretti, 2003. "Mother's Education and the Intergenerational Transmission of Human Capital: Evidence from College Openings," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(4), pages 1495-1532.
    9. Brekke, Kurt R. & Kuhn, Michael, 2006. "Direct to consumer advertising in pharmaceutical markets," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 102-130, January.
    10. Talia Bar & Dean R. Lillard, 2014. "Direct to Consumer Advertising of Pharmaceutical Drugs: Information and Persuasion," NBER Working Papers 19794, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Meyerhoefer Chad D. & Zuvekas Samuel H, 2008. "The Shape of Demand: What Does It Tell Us about Direct-to-Consumer Marketing of Antidepressants?," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 8(2), pages 1-34, January.
    12. Pierre Azoulay, 2002. "Do Pharmaceutical Sales Respond to Scientific Evidence?," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 11(4), pages 551-594, December.
    13. Toshiaki Iizuka & Ginger Zhe Jin, 2005. "The Effect of Prescription Drug Advertising on Doctor Visits," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(3), pages 701-727, September.
    14. repec:bla:jindec:v:48:y:2000:i:3:p:349-69 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Toshiaki Iizuka & Ginger Z. Jin, 2007. "Direct To Consumer Advertising And Prescription Choice," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(4), pages 771-771, December.
    16. Rosenthal Meredith B. & Berndt Ernst R. & Donohue Julie M. & Epstein Arnold M. & Frank Richard G., 2003. "Demand Effects of Recent Changes in Prescription Drug Promotion," Forum for Health Economics & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 6(1), pages 1-28, January.
    17. Meredith B. Rosenthal & Ernst R. Berndt & Julie M. Donohue & Arnold M. Epstein & Richard G. Frank, 2003. "Demand Effects of Recent Changes in Prescription Drug Promotion," NBER Chapters, in: Frontiers in Health Policy Research, Volume 6, pages 1-26, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Coscelli, Andrea & Shum, Matthew, 2004. "An empirical model of learning and patient spillovers in new drug entry," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 122(2), pages 213-246, October.
    19. Rizzo, John A, 1999. "Advertising and Competition in the Ethical Pharmaceutical Industry: The Case of Antihypertensive Drugs," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 42(1), pages 89-116, April.
    20. Bagwell, Kyle, 2007. "The Economic Analysis of Advertising," Handbook of Industrial Organization, in: Mark Armstrong & Robert Porter (ed.), Handbook of Industrial Organization, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 28, pages 1701-1844, Elsevier.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Suppliet, Moritz, 2020. "Umbrella branding in pharmaceutical markets," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Dhaval M. Dave, 2013. "Effects of Pharmaceutical Promotion: A Review and Assessment," NBER Working Papers 18830, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Anusua Datta & Dhaval Dave, 2017. "Effects of Physician‐directed Pharmaceutical Promotion on Prescription Behaviors: Longitudinal Evidence," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(4), pages 450-468, April.
    3. Dhaval Dave & Henry Saffer, 2012. "Impact of Direct‐to‐Consumer Advertising on Pharmaceutical Prices and Demand," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 79(1), pages 97-126, July.
    4. Svetlana Beilfuss & Sebastian Linde, 2021. "Pharmaceutical opioid marketing and physician prescribing behavior," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(12), pages 3159-3185, December.
    5. de Frutos, Maria-Angeles & Ornaghi, Carmine & Siotis, Georges, 2013. "Competition in the pharmaceutical industry: How do quality differences shape advertising strategies?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 268-285.
    6. Jayawardhana, Jayani, 2013. "Direct-to-consumer advertising and consumer welfare," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 164-180.
    7. Kremer, Sara T.M. & Bijmolt, Tammo H.A. & Leeflang, Peter S.H. & Wieringa, Jaap E., 2008. "Generalizations on the effectiveness of pharmaceutical promotional expenditures," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 234-246.
    8. Guy David & Sara Markowitz, 2011. "Side Effects of Competition: the Role of Advertising and Promotion in Pharmaceutical Markets," NBER Working Papers 17162, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. David B. Ridley, 2015. "Payments, Promotion, And The Purple Pill," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 24(1), pages 86-103, January.
    10. Suppliet, Moritz, 2020. "Umbrella branding in pharmaceutical markets," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    11. Toshiaki Iizuka & Ginger Zhe Jin, 2005. "The Effect of Prescription Drug Advertising on Doctor Visits," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 14(3), pages 701-727, September.
    12. Rosemary Avery & Donald Kenkel & Dean Lillard & Alan Mathios, 2007. "Regulating advertisements: the case of smoking cessation products," Journal of Regulatory Economics, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 185-208, April.
    13. John Cawley & John A. Rizzo, 2005. "The Competitive Effects of Drug Withdrawals," NBER Working Papers 11223, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Patricia M. Danzon & Eric L. Keuffel, 2014. "Regulation of the Pharmaceutical-Biotechnology Industry," NBER Chapters, in: Economic Regulation and Its Reform: What Have We Learned?, pages 407-484, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Stefan Stremersch & Vardit Landsman & Sriram Venkataraman, 2013. "The Relationship Between DTCA, Drug Requests, and Prescriptions: Uncovering Variation in Specialty and Space," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 32(1), pages 89-110, June.
    16. Brekke, Kurt R. & Kuhn, Michael, 2006. "Direct to consumer advertising in pharmaceutical markets," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 102-130, January.
    17. Toshiaki Iizuka & Ginger Zhe Jin, 2005. "Drug Advertising and Health Habit," NBER Working Papers 11770, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    18. Matthew Ryan & Rhema Vaithianathan, 2015. "The Regulation of Direct-to-Consumer Advertising of Pharmaceuticals in a Managed Care Setting," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 17(6), pages 986-1021, December.
    19. Eisenberg, Matthew D. & Avery, Rosemary J. & Cantor, Jonathan H., 2017. "Vitamin panacea: Is advertising fueling demand for products with uncertain scientific benefit?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 30-44.
    20. Lakdawalla, Darius & Sood, Neeraj & Gu, Qian, 2013. "Pharmaceutical advertising and Medicare Part D," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(6), pages 1356-1367.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Advertising; Pharmaceutical; Healthcare; Health insurance;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I11 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Analysis of Health Care Markets
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • L65 - Industrial Organization - - Industry Studies: Manufacturing - - - Chemicals; Rubber; Drugs; Biotechnology; Plastics
    • L15 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - Information and Product Quality

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:indorg:v:31:y:2013:i:2:p:181-194. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505551 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.