Advertising to Children - Attitude of a Child Towards Advertisements

Executive Summary

There has been a shift in the way our society thinks of children. There is three different children markets according to McNeal; the primary market, the influence market and the future market. Advertising to children has always been effective since advertising ever started. It is effective because researchers and advertisers in companies study the psychology of children. They study from their needs to their fantasy lives so understand how children will react to marketing. They also study and analyze how children of different ages react and their attitudes towards brands and products.

Even with a child's perception of things, parents are the main responsible consumers for their child's potential buying power. This means parents will most likely fall under a category according to quantitative data of how much they are willing to buy a product for their children, despite all the commotion a child can cause. Advertisers main goal in creating advertising towards children is to create pester power. To effectively market to children, advertisers need to know what makes kids tick.

There are many ways companies can advertise to children. With the use of commercials on TV and billboards to the use of product placement, which has become popular because of technological advances like the DVRs. With all these advertisements and commercials on the TV, it can have negative effects on children on the long run. A study we found showed that kids who saw food advertisements ate more than those who saw game advertisements. It is not a definite fact that they are going to become overweight or obese adults for sure but it may happen. Marketers exploit children's emotional vulnerabilities and play on their fears of not fitting in by promoting images of who they should be and what they own, to "be cool." This is done through television movies, magazines etc. therefore giving them unrealistic expectations of beauty, body weight, and acceptable physical appearances.

Although there are positive effects on marketing and advertising to children for the company, it may become negative towards the child in the long run.

History

The twentieth century was a time of phenomenal growth and development of new kinds of media. In the early twentieth century, film, radio and newspapers were the media form s to which children had access, though limited. In 1941, Commercial television made its debut, initiating a new era of media influence. One of the earliest documented examples of the effect of advertising in media was the introduction in 1952 of television ads for Mr. Potato Head. Gross sales were more than $4million in its first year of television advertising. At that time two-thirds of television sets were owned by families with children under the age of twelve. During the