Call for Proposals - AAA 2009
Doctoral Dissertation Competition
Submission Deadline: November 7, 2008


The American Academy of Advertising is pleased to announce its 2009 Doctoral Dissertation Competition. The competition exists to promote doctoral research in advertising. Each award is in the range of $1,000 to $2,500. In addition to the standard awards, the Dunn Award is given for outstanding proposals in the area of international advertising. Awards are based on a competitive review of dissertation proposals.

Any topic in advertising may be addressed. Winners must grant the Journal of Advertising right of first refusal on any papers resulting from the dissertation. Recipients receive half of the award at the time of selection and half of the award when the dissertation has been defended successfully. Recipients have three years to complete their dissertation from the time of the award to receive the second half of their award. For example, winners of the 2009 Competition must complete their dissertation and have their committee chairperson send a letter notifying the Chair of the AAA Research Committee by December 31, 2012.

Only members of the American Academy of Advertising working on their dissertation at the time of proposal submission are eligible for these awards. If funded, you must also maintain membership until you complete your project. Submissions based on completed or near completed dissertations are not eligible; submissions should be in the proposal stage. Applicants must be currently enrolled in a graduate program.

Applicants must submit a proposal package including the following documents. It is important to follow guidelines with regard to length and format. Proposals that do not meet the guidelines will not be entered in the competition.

Contents of Electronic Submission Package

PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL SUBMISSIONS SHOULD BE SENT ELECTRONICALLY in the formats indicated below. Submissions should include the following:

  1. A letter of endorsement from the faculty member chairing the dissertation committee. The letter verifies the credibility of the proposed topic and timetable for completion. This letter must be signed by the dissertation chairperson and sent in a pdf file.
  2. A cover email, including the following:
    • The proposal's title
    • The author's name, affiliation, and current contact information (address, phone, e-mail)
    • The name and contact information for the faculty member chairing the dissertation committee
    • A list of faculty on the dissertation committee.

To ensure that your paper is blind reviewed, do not include a title page with the proposal itself (your cover email will serve as your “title page”). Additionally, per the instructions below, you must delete all properties from your proposal.

Procedure for deleting properties for e-mail submission (in Word):

  • Go into “file”
  • Go into "properties"
  • Under the headings of “Summary” & “Custom” please erase all affiliations. Under “Custom” be sure to delete all lines in the “Properties” box and you do this by clicking on
  • Double check to make sure that the “track changes” option under “tools” is turned off


  3. The dissertation proposal. Because proposals are double blind reviewed, the student's name, geographic location, or school affiliation should not be revealed in the body of the proposal. Each proposal should include:

a. A timetable. The timetable shall outline the schedule for the completion of the dissertation, including the expected dates of the final defense and graduation.
b. A budget that itemizes the expenses required to complete the proposed research.


Proposal Contents & Organization.

The proposal’s text should motivate the topic through a thorough but brief literature review. The review should include a one paragraph statement that describes the importance of the contribution made by the proposed research. The literature review is followed by a set of research questions or hypotheses that are derived from the review. Questions/hypotheses are followed by a methodology section that succinctly outlines the research design, including the recruitment procedure (if any) to be used. If appropriate, authors should identify dependent and independent variables, treatment manipulations, experimental designs, data analysis techniques, statistical models, etc. in this section. The body of the proposal concludes with a brief statement of expected results and implications.

The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, Fifth Edition, provides an excellent resource for the style, contents and organization of a research paper and is strongly recommended to students.


Format Requirements

Proposals that fail to meet these guidelines will not be entered in the competition

  • 10 page limit. The 10 pages includes the body of the proposal plus all tables and references, but does not include the budget and timetable. The latter items should be attached as addenda to the proposal.
  • Contents must be double spaced.
  • 12 point Times New Roman font (or equivalent)
  • 1 inch margins on all 4 sides
  • Title of proposal at the top of page one
  • Page numbers

The submission package – including the proposal and letter of endorsement -- must reach the Chair of the Research Committee by 5pm on Friday, November 7, 2008. This is a received by deadline. Receipt of submissions will be acknowledged via email. Fax or postal mail submissions are not accepted. Winners will be notified by the end of February 2009 as to the status of their submission. The awards are announced at the AAA Conference and communicated to the membership through the AAA Newsletter.

Please email your materials and direct all questions to:

Dr. Janas Sinclair
Chair, AAA Research Committee
School of Journalism and Mass Communication
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Email: sinclair@unc.edu
Phone: (919) 843-5638