Table 1.
Detailed search protocol
| Field | Database and justification | Search phrase | Number yielded | Number included a |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Medical | PubMed, 1966-2013 | (celebrity OR “famous people*” OR “famous person*”) AND (endors* OR campaign* OR advert* OR advocat* OR diet* OR promot* OR market* OR produc*)b | 447 | 14 |
| Most comprehensive database of the medical literature. | ||||
| Marketing/Business | Business Source Complete, 1886-2013 | (celebrity OR “famous people” OR “famous person*” OR star) N5 (advert* OR advocat* OR campaign OR diet* OR endors* OR market* OR produc* OR promot*)c | 461 | 14 |
| Emphasizes scholarly journals over trade publications; contains more scholarly journals than ABI/INFORM Complete. | ||||
| Communications | Communication and Mass Media Complete, 1915-2013 | (celebrity OR “famous people” OR “famous person*” OR star) N5 (advert* OR advocat* OR campaign OR diet* OR endors* OR market* OR produc* OR promot*)d | 213 | 14 |
| Contains more scholarly journals than main competitor, Communication Abstracts. | ||||
| Psychology | PsycINFO, 1806-2013 | ALL((celebrity OR “famous people” OR “famous person*” OR star) n/5 (advert* OR advocat* OR campaign OR diet* OR endors* OR market* OR produc* OR promot*)) | 333 | 19 |
| Primary database for literature in psychology, with over 1800 scholarly journals. | ||||
| Culture | Humanities Abstracts, 1984-2013 | (celebrity OR “famous people” OR “famous person*” OR star) N5 (advert* OR advocat* OR campaign OR diet* OR endors* OR market* OR produc* OR promot*) | 166 | 2 |
| No dedicated cultural studies databases exist; therefore the most comprehensive humanities database was selected. | ||||
| Political Science | ProQuest Political Science, 1985-2013 | ALL((celebrity OR “famous people” OR “famous person*” OR star) n/5 (advert* OR advocat* OR campaign OR diet* OR endors* OR market* OR produc* OR promot*)) | 327 | 0 |
| Combined searching of PAIS International and Worldwide Political Science Abstracts, the two largest databases in this field. | ||||
| Neuroscience | PubMed, 1966-2013 | (celebrity OR “famous people*” OR “famous person*”) AND (brain OR fMRI OR neuro* OR neural) | 419 | 9 |
| Most comprehensive database of the medical literature. | ||||
| Sociology | Sociology Abstracts, 1952-2013 | ALL((celebrity OR “famous people” OR “famous person*” OR star) n/5 (advert* OR advocat* OR campaign OR diet* OR endors* OR market* OR produc* OR promot*)) | 194 | 32 |
| Primary database for literature in sociology, with over 1800 periodicals. |
aDocuments were included if they were both relevant to the study and unique from those found in earlier searches of different databases. This table presents the databases in the order they were searched. bThe word “star” was not included in the search strategy for PubMed due to prevalence of the word in medical research (e.g., “StAR” is an acronym for steroidogenic acute regulatory protein). cThe source type was limited to academic journals to filter out trade publications. dThe source type was limited to academic journals to filter out trade publications. The asterisk sign was used in the search phrases to search for word variations (e.g., searching person* returns person and personality).