Thursday, October 21, 2010

Advertising To Children

For every product that is on the market there is an ad for it. Not all of the ads are for children to see. Some of the products that would not be good for a five year old to see are the underwear commercial and the children twelve years of age do not need to see birth control ads. Of course there are others and I can go on for a while, but I think that you get the hint. I found a book in the Heartland Community College Library titled Advertising to Children on TV: Content, Impact and Regulation, which answers questions that I didn't even know that I had. There are three authors who wrote this book and they are Barrie Gunter, Caroline Oates and Mark Blades. There are three key points that I'm going to cover: first we will take a look at the age that children understand the ad, second point is the memory of the ad and third the effects of the slogans. Children under the age of five have a hard time understanding the difference between the show that they are watching and the ads in-between them. That is saying that children can think that they are watching a continuing show. I know that channels, such as Disney Channel, generally just promote the upcoming shows. The understanding of the ads can be confusing to children because they could be watching a show like Hannah Montana and then it could be a commercial on the next season of Hannah Montana. The way children remember the ad or commercial is for the bright colors, catchy music, and the people who are promoting. Asking a child what they remember from the ad, it could be something like "the blue truck," or "the yummy Christmas cookies." Ask an adult the same ads and you may hear answers like this "0% down on your next purchase" or "there is a sale at Wal-Mart for the Christmas cookies." Music is the same way; children like the music and adults think that it is an annoying jingle just like all of the other commercials. The State Farm and Macy's ads are known for their jingles during ads. The ads can be on the radio or on the TV, and sometimes while you are surfing the Internet or on a billboard as you are driving down the street.  Ads are everywhere and children see them, remember them and understand the message differently than adults. Next in my blog I will be going over the advertisement and how it varies from the picture to the product according to Erva.

Gunter, Barrie, Caroline Oates, and Mark Blades. Advertising to Children on TV:
     Content, Impact, and Regulation. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum
     Associates, 2005. Print.

2 comments:

  1. I do not have any children but i do teach pre-school. I see lots of logo shirts for the lasist things. Such as movie stars, cartoons and food products most of which are gird toward younger children in the first place. it is sad that people are willing to make money off of a child's product and the product only last for a coupld of month. i think that, that is such a rip off.

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  2. My children remember the toy and clothing commersals the most. They have also said the they want KFC after watching the addvertizment, right after they just ate dinner. I don't think that my children are the only ones who do this according to this post. why are food ads so applealing.

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