2012 PROCEEDINGS - Public Relations Society of America

etween client preferences, practice experience, and the best evidence,‖ (p.137). Drake et al. (2001)
conceptualized EBP to be more like ―interventions for which there is consistent scientific evidence
showing that they improve client outcomes‖ (p. 180).
There are three components that are conceptualized within the EBP. The first perspective
takes into account the individual knowledge and expertise of the practitioner, a role that may be
defined as that of a manager, technician or some hybrid of these two functions (Dozier & Broom,
2009). The second model focuses on client expectations; in higher education, service learning
incorporates client perspectives into the learning process. Students learn through their experiences
with a community partner (also referred to as ―client‖), and students report learning more about
public relations as a profession while also learning about community problems (Hon et al., 2004).
The third part of the model is best evidence. In medicine, social work, clinical psychology and public
health, EBP focuses on systematically comparing various scenarios and treatment options to help
improve the impact of practice. That means drawing upon evidence from applied research, expertise
and educational training of the practitioner involved, and the expectations and needs of the client
(Shlonsky & Gibbs, 2004).
Figure 1: Evidence Based Practice (EBP) Model (Shlonsky & Gibbs, 2004, p.138)
Method
The method used in this research study was a quasi-experimental research design, an
approach inspired, in part, by prior research about constructivist learning and the relative
effectiveness of delivering course content via different means (Day et al., 2005). The study is
composed of three different parts: an in-class scenario exercise, reaction paper, and an online
questionnaire. Three universities located in the Midwest and Southeast areas of the United States
provided the collective participant pool for this study. More than three-fourths of the participants
(N=128) had no prior internship experience (77%) or prior service learning experience (62%). None
of the participants had been formally introduced to the EBP concept in a prior public relations course.
Procedure
The first step was to introduce each class to the scenario exercise, which was a case study
presented via PowerPoint slides. The universal case study implemented for all three classes was the
Costa Cruises crisis, which occurred in January 2012. Each class selected for this study was exposed
to a different perspective on the case. One class (University 1, N=25) was exposed only to the
practitioner-focused perspective. The second class (University 2, N=47) was exposed to a version of
the case study that included the practitioner-focused perspective along with the client expectations
perspective, similar in spirit to traditional service learning. The third class (University 3, N=52) was
presented the full spectrum -- a version of the case study that provided the practitioner- and client-
199