More handpicked essays just for you.
Negative effects of advertising on children
Advertising aimed at children
Negative effects of advertising on children
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: Negative effects of advertising on children
The aforementioned statistics prove that children nowadays are overly exposed to advertising messages. But what is the problem with targeting children? Several reasons explain why advertising is considered pernicious for youngsters and why advertising to them has been identified as an ethical issue.
For one, children are considered an especially vulnerable group whom do not have an adequate level of rationalization to make decisions. As stated by the advertising industry's Children's Advertising Review Unit (CARU) “children are especially vulnerable by virtue of their inexperience, immaturity, susceptibility to being misled or unduly influenced, and lack of reasoning skills to evaluate the credibility of advertising. Children's understanding
…show more content…
Former FTC commissioner Roscoe B. Starek has stated that children would probably not comprehend hyperbolic allegations or images, mentioning the example that kids may believe a toy helicopter to come completely assembled when it does not. In short, advertising thwarts children’s ability to make their own judgment and in absence of a preexisting opinion, it imposes its own onto the little ones.
Notwithstanding children vulnerability, a second point raising concerns is that advertising makes kids highly aware of unhealthy products. This translates in an early use of such goods as noted by authors Dina Borzekowski and Joanna Cohen of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore (Healy, 2013).
The childhood obesity epidemic in the United States is attributed, among other factors, to fast food advertising targeting children. Fast food stores alone exhaust $3 billion in television ads aimed to kids (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2004). Aggressive publicity of fast food, soft drinks, and candy give way to overweight in kids and
George Parker once said, “The only people who care about advertising are the people who work in advertising." Advertisers use many different techniques that target children and teens. Many people do not realize how harmful this can turn out to be. Advertising plays a harmful role in the lives of youth because it poses health risks, prevents children and teens from saving money, and exposes them to way too many ads.
advertising is becoming a bigger role in the lives of youth. Since deregulation in 1984, the money advertisers make off of kids has been increasing by millions each year. kids who don't even have the brain function to make a good choice on what they buy are being targeted as young as 5. As young kids become more accustomed to certain products young, they continue buying them over their whole life. This is what advertisers are causing by targeting the youth. Advertisers are finding that marketing to kids makes a lot of money, the youth believe everything they hear, and the advertising techniques they do today are almost sure to work.
Did you know that 35% of the United States population is considered obese? Also, 66% of the population is considered overweight or more? (Saint Onge 2014) Even more frightening, in 2012 the Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported that more than one third of children and adolescents in America were overweight or obese (CDC 2014). The media sources used investigates the political, scientific, historical, and cultural reasons behind the childhood obesity epidemic in America. Obesity is a rapid growing epidemic in America and these sources present the facts causing this epidemic. As well as how the children of the American society are being wrongly influenced by the media, especially advertisments. (Greenstreet 2008).
Obesity in the United States, which the media has labeled a national crisis, has also been connected to poverty rates. Big fast food industry’s target poor communities, and spend millions of dollars each year to create advertising that appeals to these specific areas. These industry’s also target naïve children when advertising because they know that eating habits developed in childhood are usually carried into adulthood. Children who are exposed to television advertisements for unhealthy food and who are not educated well enough on good nutrition will grow up and feed their families the same unhealthy foods they ate as kids. A big way fast food giants are able to make certain young people have access to unhealthy food is by strategically placing franchises in close proximity to schools. They will often place three times as many outlets within walking distance of schools than in areas where there are no schools nearby. The way fast food advertising is targeted towards children is very alarming considering how important good nutrition is for young people and how a child’s eating habits can affect their growth and
The fast food industry is one of the largest sectors of the United States economy. Companies such as Burger King, Wendy's, Taco Bell, McDonalds and KFC have all become household names. Each of these companies operates under a similar mission statement: to serve a quick, filling meal for a very low cost. The primary marketing medium for these companies is television where via commercials, they can portray both their products and a lifestyle. Their intense advertising focus on minorities and children, however, has begun to exacerbate the epidemic of obesity that is sweeping our nation. Fast food's televised advertising is a significant contributor to obesity in today's minority youth. By promoting unhealthy tendencies and high-calorie foods as well as an attitude that promotes tolerance of diseases such as obesity, these companies are influencing people to such a degree that it is negatively affecting their health. This dangerous marketing method is not only sweeping America, but other countries as well. The emphasis on fast food companies' immoral marketing raises the question: Are people eating for hunger or because of an advertised, influenced habit? However, we must also address whether or not fast food companies are mainly responsible, or if the blame also covers their consumers.
How many obese children have you seen today? Obesity is one of the largest health problems Americans are currently facing. It can lead to many baleful complications, including heart disease, diabetes, sleep apnea, cancer, mobility issues, high blood pressure, bullying, and lack of self-esteem. According to the CDC, about 17% of children and adolescents aged 2-19 are obese, and 30% are overweight. In adults, around 70% are overweight and 30% are obese. Nevertheless, our nation’s public schools are continuously promoting virulent foods through its lunch programs and on-campus advertisements. Although I understand that unhealthy food is cheaper and tastier, we must remember that those foods are causing our nation’s children to become obese. Factors such as cheap unhealthy foods in school lunches, junk food ads in schools, and teachers eating pernicious foods in class are causing more and more children to make the easy choice, the unhealthy choice. Obesity is a growing epidemic in the U.S, one that we need to promptly eradicate.
According to “Burger Battles” from the Weekly Reader, obesity is defined as a person whose weight is 20 percent higher than recommended for their height (Burger Battles 1). When this condition begins to affect children lives, it is then known as childhood obesity. Within the United States of America, around 15 percent of children are considered to be obese (Holguin 3). Increasing tremendously, this outbreak has actually tripled in the amount of obese teen and doubled in children up to the age of thirteen (Burger Battles 2). One of the factors that is usually overlooked in the cause for obesity is the role of television. Not only does it reduce the amount of physical activity, the advertisements and commercials are targeting innocent viewers. In a survey completed by Gary Ruskin of Commercial Alert, the average child watches nearly 19 hours and 40 minutes of television a week (Ruskin 2). With that amount of time spent watching television, advertisements for fast food will be entering the children’s minds.
Termini, Roseann B., Thomas A. Roberto, and Shelby G. Hostetter. "Food Advertising and Childhood Obesity: A Call to Action for Proactive Solutions." ERIC. N.p., 2012. Web. 22 Apr. 2014.
It is said that fast food advertising is linked to rising childhood and teen obesity. The childhood obesity epidemic is a serious public health problem that increases morbidity, morality, and has substantial long-term economic and social costs (opposing viewpoints). Approximately 20% of our youth are now overweight with obesity rates in preschool age children increasing at alarming speed (opposing viewpoints). U.S. Surgeon General Richard Carmona said, “obesity is the fastest-growing cause of illness and death in the United States.” When I read this I was shocked. This is something that can change, but its up to ourselves to make that commitment. No one else has the power to do so but us. Did you know that treating obesity-related problems cost Americans $117 billion annually, that’s $420 per person (CQ Researcher).
One way that fast food effects obesity is by advertising their products to children (Miller). In her article Food Advertising Contributes to Obesity, Patti Miller explains that the fast food companies are targeting kids and teenagers by advertising on television. The fast food advertisements are promoting unhealthy products as acceptable food which influences children to choose those meals. The American Psychological Association, an organization focused on improving the lives of individuals, expressed that with the exposure of different fast food commercials, children request to purchase these unhealthy products and cause the parents to be influenced by these requests. This concludes the idea that once children are encouraged by the commercials, they opt to consume the fast food advertised on television. Today, fast food companies are even advertising through schools by offering pizzas and burgers as school lunches, which consequently becomes a daily meal for children and teenagers to consume (Wadden, Brownell,
The advertising is a method of communication that has a big purpose which is to persuade the audience to buy their products .Today, advertising is very remarkable and has an essential role in community.as it tends to impact on children specially. In addition, nowadays, the children are watching too much television and use the social media than previous years. Therefore, they see more advertising. Besides, although there are some good impacts of advertising on young minds, the researchers shown that, the advertising can also have several bad influences on children, particularly, if parents are incautious and do not increase the awareness of their children about the importance of money.
Across America in homes, schools, and businesses, sits advertisers' mass marketing tool, the television, usurping freedoms from children and their parents and changing American culture. Virtually an entire nation has surrendered itself wholesale to a medium for selling. Advertisers, within the constraints of the law, use their thirty-second commercials to target America's youth to be the decision-makers, convincing their parents to buy the advertised toys, foods, drinks, clothes, and other products. Inherent in this targeting, especially of the very young, are the advertisers; fostering the youth's loyalty to brands, creating among the children a loss of individuality and self-sufficiency, denying them the ability to explore and create but instead often encouraging poor health habits. The children demanding advertiser's products are influencing economic hardships in many families today. These children, targeted by advertisers, are so vulnerable to trickery, are so mentally and emotionally unable to understand reality because they lack the cognitive reasoning skills needed to be skeptical of advertisements. Children spend thousands of hours captivated by various advertising tactics and do not understand their subtleties.
And with these advertisments that these compaines throw out there, children pick up on that, and they want to buy there stuff. Thats why I think advertisments are good for children and for a
As a little girl I loved watching television shows on Saturday mornings. I’d get upset when a show would proceed to commercial. That is until I watched the shiny new toy being played with by the girl my age and of course the cool new one that came into the happy meal, then I’d forget. After seeing the appealing commercial I’d run to my mom and try to slickly mention it. “You know McDonalds has a new Monster’s Inc. toy in their happy meal. Isn’t that great? “Now I realize that back then I was targeted by big companies to beg my parents for things that I didn’t need or that wasn’t good for me in order to make money. Advertising today is affecting the health of today’s children because they eat the unhealthy foods advertised to them on: television, the internet, and even at school. Therefore, an impassioned discussion of possible solutions has been brewing.
The findings in Dittman’s article fully support my findings as well as my own personal. beliefs that advertising to children is unethical because a lot of the children watching the TV are doing so without adult supervision. A lot of children watching TV are 8 or younger and they do not fully comprehend the importance of the subliminal messages that the companies are sending. out by using their cartoons and catchy songs to hook the child into buying their products. I believe that advertising is a modern example of brainwashing and that with no parental supervision or no parental limits, our nation’s youth will be so caught up in the power of advertising, that their youth and innocence will end much faster than the generation before.