James D. Sargent et al.

About the author: Dr. James D. Sargent is associate professor in the Department of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine and the Department of Community and Family Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire. His current research involves evaluating media and marketing influences on adolescent smoking.

After assessing 250 top box-office films from 1988 to 1997, researchers discovered tobacco use in more than 85 percent of these films. Tobacco brand appearances were common even in films rated for children, and findings suggest an increase in on-screen actor-endorsement of cigarette brands. The fact that the top four U.S. cigarette brands appear most frequently in contemporary films suggests that brand advertising is the motive for tobacco product placement in films.

The visual presentation of brands in cinema films is generally thought of as a form of...