VOTE NO: OOH SOCIAL IMPACT CAMPAIGN

Experiencing the impact of gun violence and suicide within my family and local communities motivated the research direction for this social impact campaign. This book serves as a tribute to the lives lost and individuals affected by both issues, drawing attention to the danger of lenient firearm legislation during a period of unprecedented mental health crisis. VOTE NO is a gun control campaign that aims to raise awareness about the firearm suicide epidemic among adolescent children and teens in the United States. The campaign concept was developed around the tragic statistic that “more than one-third of firearm injury deaths are related to suicide in adolescents…”, with increasing rates (Children’s Safety Network, 2021). The campaign strategy is based on the misconception that people are safer when owning a gun, as supporting research from the New England Journal of Medicine shows that “household firearm possession is associated with increased risk of firearm-related adult homicide and suicide, adolescent firearm suicide, and unintentional firearm-related injury regardless of age” (Carter, Cunningham, 2024, pg 929). This book is a semester-long culmination of work from my Topics in Graphic Design Inquiry class, where I was asked to “evaluate the role of design and visual communication in addressing social issues affecting our world” (Margarita Barrios Ponce, 2023, pg 1). Imagine AI was used to generate the desired environmental conditions for mock-ups.

Sources

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Carter, P. M., & Cunningham, R. M. (2024, September 11). Clinical Approaches to the Prevention of Firearm-Related Injury. https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMra2306867

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2024, July 5). Fast Facts: Firearm Injury and Death. Firearm Injury and Death Prevention | CDC. https://www.cdc.gov/firearm-violence/data-research/facts-stats/index.html

Children's Safety Network. (2021, November 16). Firearm Safety: Preventing Death By Suicide. Firearm Safety: Preventing Death by Suicide | Children's Safety Network. https://www.childrenssafetynetwork.org/infographics/firearm-safetypreventing-death-suicide

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Everytown Research & Policy. (2022, June 2). Too Many, Too Soon: Youth Firearm Suicide in the United States.Everytown Research & Policy. https://everytownresearch.org/report/the-rise-of-firearm-suicide-among-young-americans/

Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions. (2026, July). Annual Gun Violence Data 2024: The Firearm Mortality Epidemic — Examining the U.S. Data from 2024. Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. https://publichealth.jhu.edu/center-for-gun-violence-solutions/data/annual-gun-violence-data

Morales, D. A., Barksdale, C. L., & Beckel-Mitchener, A. C. (2020, May 4). A call to action to address rural mental health disparities. Journal of Clinical and Translational Science. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7681156/

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Watford, A. (2025, June 27). Gun suicides in US reached record high in 2023. Stateline. https://stateline.org/2025/06/27/gun-suicides-in-us-reached-record-high-in-2023/