A study examined (1) how advertising practitioners perceive research related to their profession, (2) how advertising practitioners learn of current research results, and (3) how, if at all, advertising practitioners use research. Individual discussions with advertising practitioners in the San Diego market led to an initial bank of items from which final, 50-item questionnaires were constructed. These were sent to 283 advertising agencies, 96 of whom responded. Data from the 76 usable responses showed that applied research is used frequently in a day-to-day problem solving context, but theoretical research appears to be rarely used. Practitioners had positive perceptions of the value of applied research, and the more positive the practitioners' orientations to science, the more favorable was their perception of theoretical research. The analysis indicated a strong, positive relationship between practitioner perception of research and agency use of research. These results suggest that the gap between academics and advertising practitioners has narrowed. (SRT)