An Empirical Methodology for the Ethical Assessment of Marketing Phenomena Such as Casino Gambling

Abstract

The methodology proposed here exemplifies how psycho metric measures can be dovetailed to assess ethical dimen sions of social marketing phenomena such as legalized casino gambling. Three traditional ethical theories— Deontology, Teleology, and Distributional Justice—are in corporated in the methodology design. Reactions of metro household-heads to legalizing casino gambling in their city were obtainedfrom an existing metro panel. A pro-gambling attitudinal scale developed for this purpose, and tested for its reliability, discriminant and nomological validity, was the basis for deriving valid and insightful teleological and distributive assessment measures. As expected, casino gam blers and gamers obtained higher pro-gambling scores than non-gamblers. While teleological and deontological justifi cations of casino gambling were decisively low, distributive- justice related conditional acceptance of casino gambling was higher.

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