title: [Advertising and health education].
abstract: Health education and advertising have a common aim: to modify human behaviour. Health education tries to induce healthy behaviours. In some occasions Publicity proposes risky behaviours. Ads appearing during a two-month period in magazines of the largest circulation in Spain are analyzed here. A total of 1,726 ads which could have a negative influence on health either because of the product or service offered or for the use of health as a persuasive argument in their text, are considered. The magazines Hola and Lecturas had the highest ratio ads/magazine. Spirits, food and drugs were the most frequently advertised products. And more than 50% of the ads used health and welfare as argument for better selling. Health educators should know and teach the critical analysis of publicity, and use advertisements as a teaching tool to enable people to see through misleading advertising.
authors.affiliation: Area de Medicina Preventiva y Salud Pública, Departamento de Medicina, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Oviedo.
authors.forename: M L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: López González
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Cueto Espinar
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Martínez Cuervo
authors.forename: M L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Redondo Cornejo
authors.forename: J R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Suárez González
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Secall Mellén
mesh_terms: D000329:Advertising / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D015438:Health Behavior; D006266:Health Education / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D010506:Periodicals as Topic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D013030:Spain
vernacular_title: Publicidad y educación sanitaria.