The impact of television advertisement on children

Résumé du document

The average child is exposed to more than 40,000 television commercials a year. My focus is devoted primarily to the examination of television advertising for three reasons. Firstly, marketers who seek children for commercial purposes rely primarily on television because it is the easiest and most effective media for reaching large numbers of children nationwide. Secondly, television has an impact on children at much earlier ages than printed media can achieve, largely because textual literacy does not develop until many years after children have become regular television viewers. And thirdly, much is known about how children understand and are influenced by television advertising, while almost no evidence is available in the public domain regarding how children respond to advertising in new media environments such as the Internet. In the following sections, I will review what is known about the nature of children's exposure to advertising, before dealing with children's ability to recognize and defend against advertising messages, and in a third and last part I will expose the effects of advertising on children. With the globalization of mass media, the style of consumerism associated with modern industrialized societies of the western world has spread all around the planet. Young people can thus be recognized as a unique all-important market in their own right. Interest in young people really began with the baby boom generation after the second world war".

Extraits

[...] The major factor for this is probably the changes in the media environment. Most advertising is delivered via media channels, and there have been a number of progresses in the technological capabilities for delivering information during the past ten or twenty years. According to ESOMAR website, television is one of the most effective ways of influencing mass culture (Shari Donnenfeld and Andy Goodhand Digital Kids: Navigating and Making Sense of a World of Choice, WARC) and marketers can be happy when we know that the number of television channels received in the average home has increased with the transmission of cable television and satellite technologies. [...]

[...] My focus is devoted primarily to the examination of television advertising for three reasons. Firstly, marketers who seek children for commercial purposes rely primarily on television because it is the easiest and most effective media for reaching large numbers of children nationwide. Secondly, television has an impact on children at much earlier ages than printed media can achieve, largely because textual literacy does not develop until many years after children have become regular television viewers. And thirdly, much is known about how children understand and are influenced by television advertising, while almost no evidence is available in the public domain regarding how children respond to advertising in new media environments such as the Internet. [...]

[...] In summary, the studies indicate that the ability to recognize persuasive intent does not appear for most children before 8 years old. Even at that age, this capability develops in rudimentary form. Finally, we must point out that this understanding is linked to the development of the child's cognitive capabilities, and heavy viewers of television are in no way better than their same-aged counterparts at recognizing the persuasive intent of television advertising. III) Effects of advertising on children The impacts of television advertising on young children are numerous. [...]

[...] It's Gene Del Vecchio (2002:204), Ever Cool, Pelican Publishing Company Most children learn about toys from television and even if they only see the advertisement once they will desire the toy. Thus, certain advertising strategies tend to enhance the effectiveness of advertising appealing to children. Celebrities shown in advertisements tend to also enhance children's liking of the product. According to an article of the Advertising and Marketing to children's journal, three quarters of children demands for products in Malaysia are for advertised products on television (Noor Hasmini A. Ghani Osman M. Zain Malaysian Children's Attitudes Towards Television Advertising, Vol Issue WARC). This pattern can be observed in different countries. [...]

[...] Areas of Concern and Policy Implications”, International Journal of Advertising, WARC, Vol 20 No 1 Understanding the Impact of Media on Children and Teens (date of edition unknown), American Academy of Paediatrics' website http://www.aap.org/family/mediaimpact.htm Television's Impact on Kids (2005), Media Awareness Network, http://www.media- awareness.ca/english/parents/television/tv_impact_kids.cfm References Barrie Gunter and Adrian Furnham, “Children as Consumers”, London and New York P Flemming Hansen, “Children, consumption, advertising and media”, Copenhagen Business school press P Gene Del Vecchio, Ever Cool, Pelican Publishing Company P.204 Jorian Clarke, (2002) The Internet According to Kids, journal published by World Advertising Research Center, Vol 3 No 2 Kara Chan and James U. McNeal, “Chinese children's attitudes towards television advertising: truthfulness And liking International Journal of Advertising, WARC Noor Hasmini A. Ghani Osman M. [...]