Celebrating 50 Years of the Journal of Advertising and Beyond

Welcome to the 50th anniversary special issue of the Journal of Advertising (JA). JA has become what it is today because of the people behind it and the scholarly articles it provides. Over the past 50 years (1972–2022), that equals 202 issues and more than 1,400 published articles. This issue, Volume 51, Issue 5, has several special features. First, we announce those papers selected as the “best” articles for the first 50 years of JA along with those papers that were nominees and semifinalists. Second, we invite you to explore our 50th anniversary special section, “Reimagining Advertising Research: 50 Years and Beyond,” coedited by Jisu Huh and Ron Faber, along with additional articles prepared in honor of JA’s 50th anniversary. In addition, this publication serves as my 15th and final issue of JA after three incredible years as editor in chief, and it’s appropriate to share a few reflections, which you’ll find in my postlude editorial at the end of this issue. Now that you know what you’ll find in these pages, let’s dig into what we mean when we talk about articles thought of as the best. To answer this question, the editorial board commissioned a very special virtual collection selected from articles published in JA over the past five decades. As you might imagine, reviewing and evaluating all of these articles was a complicated endeavor. To choose the initial list of nominees for the best articles covering 1972–2021, a committee cochaired by Marla Royne Stafford and Charles R. Taylor was formed. I appointed committee members, including Les Carlson, Chingching Chang, Patrick de Pelsmacker, Martin Eisend, Wei-Na Lee, Michelle Nelson, Shintaro Okazaki, Cristel Russell, and Esther Thorson. The committee’s procedure included three steps: First, past recipients of the annual JA Best Article Award were named as nominees. Second, subcommittees representing the time periods 1972–1979 and 1980–1988 (before the Best Article Award was implemented) considered citations and other criteria to establish a list of nominees by year. Third, an at-large subcommittee generated additional nominations by considering citations and other criteria from articles from the entire journal covering 1972 to the present. The full committee then voted on the nominees and added those with the most votes to the list of nominees, resulting in 60 best-article nominations in total (see Table 1). Next, members of the American Academy of Advertising selected two to three articles per decade from the list of nominees; articles with the most nominations were designated as semifinalists. Finally, the JA 2021 editorial board voted from the list of semifinalists by selecting one to two articles per decade. The 15 articles (three for each of five decades) with the most votes were selected as the final best articles in 50 years of JA to be featured in a virtual collection commissioned by the editorial board and located on the JAwebsite. A complete list of the results is shown in Table 1. In addition, the 15 articles selected as the best—three articles representing each of five decades—can be accessed in our virtual collection on the JA website. Although reaching this point was a difficult task given all the excellent research and discussion that has been featured in JA over the past 50 years, it was rewarding to see the range of articles, authors, topics, and institutions represented in the final tally. Indeed, it is a testament to the scholarly work done in our field over the past half century and a point of pride for everyone involved. I’m grateful to the members of the selection committee for their service on this important endeavor and to all those who voted. In addition, committee cochairs Marla and Ray did yeoman’s work in leading this effort. I encourage you to read their article in this issue that provides a very useful framework, discussion, and guidance for the 60 nominated articles with emphasis on the 15 articles selected as the best in 50 years. Thank you for joining us to give JA the tribute it deserves and to help assure JA can continue to serve our academic community for the next 50 years and beyond.