Blog 5: Do children buy into adverts?

Due to the rapid technological advances in today’s society, companies are now able to advertise their products across a wide range of media such as television, radio, internet and posters. The purpose of advertising is to increase purchases of a product (Gunter, Oates and Blades, 2005) and children especially are deemed more vulnerable to the effects of advertising than adults (Banaji, 2010). Cooke (2002) notes how children in the United Kingdom and United States spend, on average, between four and five hours a day accessing technological media outside of school through which advertisements are transmitted. Furthermore, approximately 10 minutes of every hour is dedicated to adverts on television thus making children a prime target to appeal to as consumers. Therefore, teachers need to provide an education to pupils about advertising, to make them more aware of its purpose and uses and to unpick the narratives within them (Banaji, 2010).

Advertising to children is surrounded by controversy, with it often being suggested that children ‘need protecting from the effects of advertising in general or from the advertising of particular product’ (Gunter et al., 2005: 2). However, Beder (2009) states that advertisements are the means by which companies actively encourage children to seek happiness and esteem through consumption. Alternatively, Gunter et al (2005) suggest that children today, particularly girls, are ‘getting older younger’ and this is due to images they see on television and in magazines of ‘the perfect model’. This can often have a negative impact on children as it reinforces pressures to conform to ideals of beauty that are hard or impossible to achieve (Gunter et al., 2005).

Gunter et al (2005) suggest that a less controversial example of advertising is toys as they are more age appropriate. However, according to Nairn (2011), children are often ‘brand bullied’ or left out for not having the latest product as advertisers give children a false sense of desire for a toy that parents cannot afford. Livingstone and Helsper (2006) found that there is evidence that children of all ages are affected by advertising, thus this can be seen as the exploitation of children who have little understanding of the persuasive nature of advertisements and the power that they hold. This point was raised in seminar discussions as this is a key issue related to children being consumers of advertisements.

However, despite there being many negative attitudes, Burrell and Beard (2010) state that the study of advertisement in schools can develop children’s skills in persuasive writing due to the type of language that is used in adverts. Within the National Curriculum (DfE, 2013) it is highlighted that children should identify the audience for and the purpose of their writing, therefore teachers could incooperate advertisements within literacy lessons to develop children’s persuasive writing. Using adverts as an example is relevant to children and can be much more exciting when combining the use of technology with literacy (Monteith, 2002). Children need to engage not only with advertising, but with all which is around them in the world to greater prepare them for society.  In this way, it is proposed that children increase their ability to judge the ‘facts, opinions and persuasive content’ of advertisements (Banaji, 2005).

Banaji, S. (2010) ‘Analysing Advertisements in the Classroom’ in Bazelgette, C. (Ed) Teaching Media in Primary Schools. London: Sage

Beder, S. (2009) This Little Kiddy went to Market. New York: Pluto Press

Burrell, A. and Beard, R. (2010) Children’s Advertisement Writing. Literacy. 44 (2) pp 83 - 90.

Cooke, T. (2002) in Gunter, B., Oates, C. & Blades, M. (2005) Advertising to Children on TV. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. pp1 – 13

Department for Education (2013) National Curriculum in England: English programmes of study- key stages 1 and 2. London: HMSO

Gunter, B., Oates, C. & Blades, M. (2005) Advertising to Children on TV. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. pp1 – 13

Livingstone, S. and Helsper, E. (2006) ‘Does Advertising Literacy mediate the effects of Advertising on children? A critical examination of two linked research literatures in relation to obesity and food choice’, Journal of Communication, 56 (3):560 – 84.

Nairn, A. (2011) Compulsive Consumerism – Child Rearing in the UK. New Left Project