Content Analysis of Advertisements in Childrens Television in the 1950s

8/12/2019 Content Analysis of Advertisements in Childrens Television in the 1950s

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Be Back In a Moment : Content Analysis ofAdvertisements in Children's Television in the 1950s

lison Alexander, Louise M. Benjamin, Keisha Hoerrner, and Darrell RoeThe children s television advertising environment generally is studied from the 1970s onward. Indeed so litacademic research was reported in the 1950s that the decade has been referred to as the prehistory of reseaon children s television advertising. The authors rectify that oversight by examining commercials of the 1950in programs aimed a t the child market. Content analysis shows marked distinctions from commercials ofsubsequent decades in total commercial time, product type, promotional appeals, age and gender ofpartici-pants, production variables, and controversial techniques. Some of the differences are due to the televisiontechnology and technical standards of the 1950s, but others illustrate growth in advertisers and television

^executives understanding of the medium as a way to reach specialized child audiences.

Alison Alexander (Ph.D., OhioState University) is a Professor andDepartment Head of the Departmentof Telecommu nications, College ofJournalism and MassCommunication, University ofGeorgia.

Lou ise M. Bei\]am in (Ph.D.,University of Iowa) is AssistantProfessor an d Associate Director ofPeabody Awards, Departm ent ofTelecomm unications, C ollege ofJournalism and MassCommunication, University ofGeorgia.

Keisha Hoer rner (Ph.D.,University of Georgia) is AssistantProfessor of Mass Communication,Louisiana State University.Darrel l Roe (Ph.D., University ofGeorgia) is As sista nt Professor inthe School of Communication, MaristCollege.The authors are listed alphabetically.They contributed equally to thearticle.

Journal of Advertising,Volume XXVII Number 3Fall 1998

The 1950s were a seminal decade in the development of marketing tchildren. McNeal (1987,1992) and Schneider (1987) describe the era as onin which the number of children increased d ramatically as the baby boomewere born, and general economic stability brought consumer goods withithe reach of most families. Pa ren ts who had been through the deprivationof the Depression and World War II vowed tha t their children would experience affluence. Consequently, children became a market . Halberstam (1993describes the 1950s as a decade of genera l goodwill and expanding prosperity in which few Americans doubted the essential goodness of their societybut also as a time of growing challenge to the old order, much of it produceby critical changes in technology, including television.

The children's television advertising environment generally is studiefrom the 1970s onward. So little academic research was reported in th1950s that Pecora (1995) refers to the decade as the prehistory of researchon children's television advertising. Early academic literature considerechildren as developing markets and focused on their recall of televisioadvertising (Brumbaugh 1954), buying habits (Guest 1955), and influencon parental purchases (Munn 1958).

We rectify the oversight by examining what happened during the 1950swhen television advertising to children began, and describing the televisionads designed to appear in children's programs of that decade. Our researcshows that advertisements of the 1950s differ substantially from those othe decades that followed, and many of the differences reflect both thgrowth of the child audience and adve rtisers' recognition of that audience aan emerging market. Because the evolutionary changes in television, TVaudiences, and children as a market began in the 1950s, we review thembriefly a s background for our discussion of the evolution of children 's televsion advertisemen ts to 1960.

Fac tors in Television, V Ad vertising, and theEvolution of Children's Prog ram m ing in the 1950s

Growth of TelevisionThe 1950s were a time of great change in television. In 1950, 9% o

American hom es had television sets; by decade's end, sets were present i


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87% of homes (Sterling an d Kittross 1990). Most sta-tions broadcast monochrome signals to the black-and-white television sets. Studio cameras were mono-chrome, bulky, equipped with tu rre t lenses instead ofzoom lenses for changes in camera shot perspective,and primitive in technology. Studio sw itchers lackedsophisticated special effects, and usu ally the directorcould select only from a sequence of simple in-studioshots. Most programs a t the decade's beginning werelive. Any copies were recorded by a kinescope projec-tor, a device in which a motion picture camera photo-graphed images on a television picture tube. Video-tape w as introduced in 1956 but was not widely useduntil the 1960s (Sterling and Kittross 1990). Conse-quently, copies of programs and commercials fromthe 1950s are difficult to obtain (Schneider 1987).

The broadcast day increased during the 1950s. Thefirst daypart filled by networks and stations was 6:00to 11:00 p.m., and the total evening hours offeredremained fairly constant during the decade. Duringthe 1950s daytime and weekend programs increasedtremendously. From 1949 to 1960 total daytime broad-cast hours more than quadrupled, and weekend hoursincreased tenfold. Much of the increase occurred from1949 through 1955. Overall, the network time de-voted to children's programming declined dramati-cally in the evening hours, but rose almost as dra-matically during daytime and weekends (Lichty and

Topping 1975).Because most households in the 1950s had only onetelevision set, programs appealing to adults as wellas children were seen as a way of attracting the en-tire family. At the decade's beginning such showsoften had one sponsor that underwrote the entireprogram, or dual (shared) sponsorship withnoncompeting advertisers rotating sponsorship. Thatsystem w as imported from radio. As production costsincreased in the early to mid-1960s the 30- to 60-second spot announcements familiar today replacedsole or dual sponsorship. During the 1950s mostchildren's programs, and many adult shows, werecontrolled by the sponsor and i ts advertising agency,which often packaged th e program, commercials andall. Early children's shows were designed to sell TVsets by enhancing television's appeal to the entirefamily (Sterling and Kittross 1990; Lichty and Top-ping 1975). Hence, much advertising that supportedfamily/children's programm ing was for adult-orientedproducts. By decade's end children's programs hadshifted to less valuable m orning, early afternoon, orSatu rday m orning hours from m ore valuable eveninghours (Palmer and Dorr 1980).

Growth of Television Advertising

Television expanded the Held of advertising. At firthe agencies' television de partm ents were smalunderstaffed, but that situation changed quicRosser Reeves, a preem inent advertising execut ohis time, noted, We discovered that th is was no tamkitten ; we had a ferocious man -eating tiger We coutake the same advertising campaign from prinradio and put it on TV, and even when there wvery few sets, sales would go through the (Halberstam 1993, p. 501). Madison Avenue's television billings jum ped from $12.3 million in to $128 million in 1951. However, developing television advertis ing was difficult: The firsstinct was to transfer people who had done radthe television d epartmen t, whe reas what was newas a miniature movie production team (Halbersta1993, p. 302).

According to Fox (1984), a typical 1950s ad forced a simple theme with a simple visual demstration: Wonder Bread helps build strong botwelve ways ; M&Ms melt in your mouth, noyour hand s. Reeves, the most influential advoc othat approach, believed the only way to cut throadvertising clutter was to offer a unique se lling prosition (USP) which through repetition would be linketo the producteven though the repe tition somet

upset viewers. N onetheless, a creative revolutionbrewing that would explode in the 1960s withcreation of image advertising.

Creation and Evolution of Children sProgramm ing

Early ch ildren's television programming borrofrom radio and motion picture serials and develfurther through sponsor/television industry collration. Action adventure shows such as Sky KingRoy Rogers and The Lone Ranger made the trantion from radio to television smoothly, but othsuch as Jack A rmstrong and Captain Midnight didnot. Motion picture serials such a s Hopalong assidyand The Little Rascals became staples on the telesion screen. In addition, children's television vashows evolved, such as Howdy Dowdy Super Cir-cus an d Kukla Fran and Ollie. In the morninCaptain Kangaroo brought children a m ixturesongs, skits, education, and fun. In 1954, an ADisney deal brought The Mickey Mouse Club intchildhood afternoons and nearly owned the grschool audience. ABC, a struggling network du


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the 1950s, gave its child and adult audiences a novelhour-long series, Disneyland in 1954 (Sterling andKittross 1990; Turow 1981; Wooleiy 1985).

Schneider (1987) dates the modem era of children'stelevision to Disneyland and events in 1955. Toda3^sSaturday morning daypart did not exist in the early1950s, and networks had not realized "the value in achildren's market, beyond making them an influen-tial force in a family's decision to buy a television set"(Schneider 1987, p . 13). In addition , the economic mo-tivation for children's advertising did not developuntil later (Schneider 1987). That incentive evolvedover the decade as the industry m atured.

During the "anything goes on TV" decade, "spon-sors routinely showed children acquiring super-hu-man streng th by eating breakfast cereals, or leaving

their friends choking in a cloud of dust kicked up bythe sponsor's sneak ers" (Hall 1984, p . 101). They alsoused special film effects to make toys seem larger,faster, and more "lifelike" (Hall 1984). Host sellinginterrupted programs to endorse toys, cereals, andcandies. For instance. Captain Midnight, HowdyDoody, and everyone's favorite teacher. Miss Francesof ing ong School sold Ovaltine, a flavored addi-tive for m ilk (Hall 1984).

Researchers studying advertising to children dur-ing the 1950s focused more on effect than content.For example, Brum baugh (1954) stated th at children

could often recall numerous ads for products not aimedat them. When 400 children were asked to list asmany products advertised on TV as they could, theynamed detergen t, beer, cigarettes, cosmetics, and au-tomobiles before cereals, candy, and d esserts. G uest(1955) reviewed development of brand loyalty overtime as children grew into adults and found littlecorrelation between early and later preferences. Munn(1958) stated that children influenced parental pur-chases in nine of 10 homes, and added that 85% ofchildren from two to eight years of age recognizedadvertised products "almost always" or "frequently."

He concluded tha t children's television programs werean effective advertising tool.Toy manufacturers that are household names to-

dayMattel, Hasbro, Fisher-Pricewere unknownto consumers in the early 1950s. However, m arryinga M attel commercial to Disney's Mickey Mouse lubin 1955 changed that situation, and the introductionof Barbie in 1958 cemented the interrelationship oftelevision and toys (Hall 1984; Schneider 1987). Atthe sam e, today's traditiona l cereal advertisers movedinto the m arket. Kellogg's created cartoon characte rsfor its cereals, including Tony the Tiger (Frosted

Flakes) and Snap Crackle and Pop (Rice Krispies),and advertised to children and adults alike. GeneralMills also designed cartoon cha racters for its cereals.One of the longest runn ing commercial gags began inthe 1950s with the Twix Rabbit's attempts to tasteTrix cereal (Hall 1984, p. 105-111). Over the next 15to 20 years, television for children became an indus-try unto itself Most of the stan da rds, including mar-keting and advertising techniques, took form duringthose years (Schneider 1987).

By the early 1960s, broadcasters and regulatorsalike had recognized TVs growing impact on chil-dren. In its 1960 program policy statement, t he FCClisted "Programs for Children" as one of the 14 m^jorelements necessary for broadcasters to meet theirpublic interest obligations (FCC 1960). In his famous

"vast wasteland" speech, Minow (1961) chastisedbroadcasters for their poor offerings for child audi-ences, especially because broadcasters themselves hadrecognized children as a special audience in theirtelevision code and had adopted guidelines regulat-ing toy advertising on TV (Palmer and Dorr 1980).Clearly, the decade of the 1950s had brought a trans-formation in children's programming and advertis-ing.

Research Focus and Justification

The authors cited above relied on anecdotal evi-dence to describe the evolution of advertising inchildren's programming. None provided a rigorousacademic review of material from the 1950s, largelybecause this "live" decade's programming is difficultto find. Fortunately, the Peabody Collection at theUniversity of Georgia has copies of programs fromthat decade, including children's programs. The col-lection is a fortuitous outgrowth of the prestigiousGeorge Foster Peabody Awards housed and adm inis-tered by the College of Journalism and Mass Com-munication at the University of Georgia. Commer-

cials used in our study came from the collection's195 s programming specifically designated by the in-dustry as targeting a child audience.

Systematically characterizing and analyzingchildren's television advertisements from the 1950sgives unique insight to rarely seen or studied ads andhow children's ads in general evolved over the courseof tha t formative decade. Our research asks w hat ha sendured since then, what was borrowed from othermedia, what was created specifically for television,and wha t was discarded in the evolution of the con-temporary children's television advertising environ-


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ment. Because extensive research into children'stelevision advertising b^an in the 1970s and because1970s research provides m any variables, we adopted thosevariables to facUitate comparisons to ids in the 1950s.

Advertising Stud ies from the 197 s tothe 199 s

In a series of studies, Barcus (1977, 1978) andWinick et al . (1973) described a 1970s environment inwhich tota l commercial time averaged from 12 to nineminutes per hour (diminishing over the decade), prod-uct types advertised to children were limited prima-rily to four types (toys, cereals, candies and snacks,and fast foods), and prom otional appeals were prima-rily to fun and happiness (Atkin and Heals 1977;

Doolittle and Pepper 1975). Information was

presentedabout the product but not always in a manner und er-standable to children (Barcus 1980). The handful ofstudies from the 1980s examined Saturday morningnetwork children's television with basically the sameresults (Condry, Bence, and Scheibe 1988; Stern andHarmon 1984).

Kunkel (1992) describes the environment of 1990 incable, affiliate and independent stations, finding di-versity across those channels. Broadcast networksprovided the greates t am ount of advertising, and cablesignificantly less. Cable had the w idest range of prod-

ucts advertised. The most prevalent promotionaltheme remained fun, appearing in more than 25%of the ads, with t aste and product performance eachappearing in about 18% of the ads. Roughly half of allads in 1990 included a t least one disclosure/disclaimer.More than half of the ads were live action, a depar-ture from the animated ads that made up the major-ity in the 1970s. Premiums appeared in 10% of allads, consistent w ith research finding s of the 1970s.

By adapting the research cited to the advertise-ments of the 1950s, we developed categories to expe-dite comparisons and aid analysis. The categories

included total commercial time, product type, promo-tional appeals, age and gender of participants, pro-duction v ariables, and controversial techniques (seeTable 1).

MethodsWe conducted content analysis to gain basic infor-

mation on the content of the commercials in children 'sprograms of the 1950s. Tha t method was chosen be-cause it is deemed best at giving a scientific, quan ti-tative, and generalizable description of communica-

tions content (Kassarjian 1977, p. 10). Our sample

came from the Peabody Archives. We coded 75 commercials from 24 shows, which represent the bulkall children's shows for that decade in which advtisements appeared (n=30). Six children's shows wernot coded because their condition on kinescope wtoo fragile for viewing.

All commercial messages were coded with the eception of the brief sponsor announcem ent ( This showis brought to you by... ) found at the beginning anend of most shows. Categories were modeled on thosemployed by Barcus (1977) and Kunkel (1992) to cilitate comparisons. For commercials, coding includlength, target audience (adult, child, mixed), partipants (gender and age of all participants, primapartic ipan ts, and spokespersons), presence or absenof selling techniques (including disclaimers, premiuoffers, host selling, and asking parents to buy tproduct) product type, promotional content/appeaand production v ariables.

Each of the 75 commercials was assigned to onethe major product t)T)e categories derived from prevous research (Kunkel 1992; Barcus 1977) plus other category. The categories, with their principconstituents from the sample, were toys (Space-Phone or a Winky Dink kit for drawing along withe program), cereals (Pep, Shredded W heat, RaisBran), snacks (candy bars and soda), fast food (nonand other (e.g., 12 ads for dairy food such as milk, i

cream, and cheese; seven for appliances, six for dfood, and four for automobiles).Promotional content/appeals were coded for info

mational content (price, features of the product, prouct attr ibu tes , performance) and for appeals (fun/hapiness, taste/flavor/smell, new/innovative, and othethat proved to be less prevalent, including adventuraffiliation, energy, and conformity). Informational content emphasizes the product's features or capabities, such as how a new toy works. Appeals link psychological motive to the product. Fun simply assoate s positive affect with product use; taste/flavor/sme

includes such sensory descriptors as crunchy, decious, rich; new/innovative stresses the unique atributes of the product. The use of humor in the awas also coded. All ads were coded as rev ealing one omore promotional appeals.

Because production techniques of the 1950s could varso radically from current norms, production variabalso were examined. Each commercial was coded fvisual format (animated, live action, or mixed), character activity (low, moderate, or high), and the preence or absence of certain visua l and audito ry speceffects, including closeups, graphics , product d ispl

sound effects, and others.


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Table 1Advertising in Cliiidren's Teievision of the 1950s, 1970s, and 1990s

Commercial TimeLength commercial time

Product TypeToysCerealsCandy/snacksFast FoodOther

Promotional Appeals

FunTasteNew/innovativeProduct information

Production TechniquesAnimation

LiveAnimatedMixed

Activity Level (Pace)Low

ModerateHigh

Jingles

ParticipantsSpokespersons'

Adult MaleAdult FemaleChildren

Selling TechniquesDisclaimersHost Selling

Ask parentsPremiums/Prizes

1:07

6.720.017.300.056.0

56.053.338.7

100.0

68.01.3

30.7

52.0

28.017.3

18.7

76.016.0

8.0

9.354.7

12.014.7

1950sChildren

1:11NA

8.323.321.700.046.7

66.758.330.0

100.0

70.01.7

28.3

55.0

26.718.3

23.3

71.812.815.4

8.361.7

15.018.3

1970s

30 sec15.9

18.124.828.810.414.3

42.859.717.424.7'

58.016.026.0

10.0

39.051.0 8

41.1 *

66.06.09.0

41.00.0

1.3i19.0

1990sf

NA

16.8

17.031.232.4

8.711.4

26.6*18.8

2.6NA

55.917.027.1

NA

NANA

NA

NA

NA

51.1NA

NA13.5

'Barcus (1977) unless otherwise noted Kunkel (1992). Eating places.' Winicketal . (1973).* Unlike data from 1950s and 1970s, only Q O S appeal couid be coded per ad.' Some product description.a Dooiittle and Pepper (1975). High = fast (26%) and very fast (25%). Winicketal . (1973).' Percentages are of ads that had spokespersons.I Winick et at . (1973).


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Four coders were trained to analyze comm ercials.Percentage of agreement was used to calculateintercoder reliability, which initially ranged from .75to 1.0 (Holsti 1969). Coding discrepancies were re-solved through discussion before analysis continued.Frequencies \vere run on all variables to determinethe overall profile of the advertising studied. Cross-tabulations with chi-square tests for signiflcance wereused to assess variability due to target audience (child,adult, mixed) or time (first versus second half of thedecade).

su l t s

Neither program length nor commercial length wascompletely standard ized during the 1950s. Programsbegan on the hour, half-hour, and sometimes quar-ter-hour, though commercials, public service an-nouncements, station promotions, or other flll ma-terials were used to round out timing for shows run-ning less than the allotted time. As the decade pro-gressed, a tendency toward todaj^s more standard-ized timing developed, especially in prime time, buttoda)^s program lengths w ere by no means the normeven in 1959. Programs ranged from a low of 14.19minutes Lucky Pup, 1950) to a high of 59.35 minutes Disneyland 1954). The mean length for programsover the decade was 37.4 minutes. Commercial lengthvaried widely, from a low of 11 seconds to a high ofthree m inutes 24 seconds, with a mean of one minutenine seconds and a mode of 60 seconds (n=12). Totalcommercial time in programs averaged 9%, compa-rable to the maximum of 12 minutes per hour week-day/nine minutes per hour weekends, or 20% and15%, respectively, allowed today under the C hildren'sTelevision Act of 1990.

By 1959, advertised product tjT)e had not evolvedinto the big four of contemporary children's advertis-ing: toys, cereals, candy/snacks, and fast foods. In-deed, those traditional categories of today comprised

only 44% of the advertising on children's programs inthe 1950s, with other advertisements for productssuch as appliances (e.g., the GE rotisserie oven), dogfood (Ken-L-Ration), and food (not fast food but staplessuch as diary products and peanut butter) compris-ing 56% of total advertising (see Table 1).

With such a large other category, the advertisingtarget in the advertisements within children's pro-grams is an important issue. Analysis revealed that54.7% (n=41) of the ads were targeted to children,25.3% (n=19) were targeted to both paren ts and chil-dren (e.g., kids, it's delicious and mothers , it's good

for them , too ), and only 15 (20 ) were targeted soleto adults. However, a significant relationship wfound between product type and target (x = 10.8p


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1950s commercials (n=29). They were a primary par-ticipant in only 10 commercials examined (16.7%),and in only six ads (10%) were they spokesperson forthe product. Women fared worse than children; 23ads (38.3%) had female adult participants; in onlyfive ads (8.3 ) was a wom an the spokesperson for theproduct. Across the decade, however, the percentageof ads with ad ults a s primary participants decreased,whereas ads w ith no host or children a s primary par-ticipants increased (x*=13.3, p


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Some of our findings are understandable given themilieu of 1950s advertising and program productionpractices. First, full sponsorship of programming wasthe norm . Second, programm ing was limited in avail-ability. Third, because of television's novelty, even

programs aimed p rimarily at the child audience werewatched by everyone, a fact that advertisers knew.Hence, it is not surprising t ha t m ore diverse producttypes were available during the decade and th at em-phasis on the big four was not evident unt il laterdecades when segmentation of the viewing audiencebegan to create the Satu rday m orning cartoon lineup.As multiple television sets became more common inAmerican homes in the late 1960s, fragmentation ofthe audience continued.

Our findings also dispel some m3^hs. One mightassume early ad vertising was crude because the pro-duction techniques were new. That w as not the case;film was well established and early television wasdone live (in film style) or on film. Nonetheless, thetranslation to the small screen of advertising did re-quire much learning. Further, advertising was notsubstantially different in appeals, as a reasonableconsistency in appeals is seen across the decades.Fun, newness, and ta ste were all used in the 1950s asthey have been subsequently. The same appeals hadbeen used in radio advertising. The information-free,image-only ad found today developed in later decades.Finally, much of the controversy tha t embroiled the1970s had its roots in practices used from the begin-ning. Ironically, by the time rules had been estab-lished to prevent host selling, the practice had be-come much less common than it had been in the 1950s.Production control was often in the hand s of agenciesin the 1950s. They set commercials within programs,and some made little effort to distinguish programcontent from advertising. That endemic practice be-comes apparent when we place all 75 commercialsanalyzed in our study into three general categories:(1) integral, or ones that were an extension of theshows themselves, (2) segues, or ones tha t linked theshows' segments together, and (3) spots, or ones th atwere clearly external to the shows. In addition, sepa-rating commercials according to target audience (e.g.,adult or child) illustra tes the practice more forcefully.

Integral commercials were an elemental p art of theshow's lineup and provided entertainment indistin-guishable from preceding and subsequent segments.That type of ad was the second most prevalent, 29.3%of all ads observed (n=22), and featured live perfor-mances by characters who had already establishedthemselves with the audience and then continued in

their respective roles in the commercial segmenSuch ads had no clear beginning or end. Of the integral ads, only three were aimed at adults. Whadults-only ads are factored out, 31.7% of childreads were integral.

Indeed, in those children's ad s, the sponsor's pruct was advocated with no observable attem pt to guise the way the product was sold (e.g., the sdialogue, etc.). In each case the already quick pgram tempo was kep t moving by performers (e.gbarker, a weight lifter, clowns, and/or hosts) in a fapaced talent show style that highlighted their abties as well as the product's attributes.

Segue commercials were also performed live by program characters and som etimes included preproduclips. Though clearly separate from program perfmances of the characters, segue ads oflen functionas transitions between show segments. They wseparated from the rest of the show verbally (e It's time now to talk about Ken-1-Ration,Zoo Prade), by change of set, and/or by fading to and frblack between the ad and the program. Among ads, segue commercials were the third most commtype (28%; n=21), but among ads aimed at child31.7% were segue. As in the integral commerciaestablished characters (e.g., the Mouseketeers in ThMickey Mouse Club) or a participant-host (e.g.. ZoParade) delivered the sponsor's message. Occasioally, the host(s) appeared only between show sements (e.g.. The Quaker Oats/Gabby ayes Show)

The 19 children's segue ads did, however, makdefinite break from program action. For example,Space Patrol the host, dressed as a Space P atrolleintroduced and concluded the program and sold spsor products on an ultramodern set resemblingrocket control room. The Mickey Mouse Club s livads featured background flats and set pieces simito play areas for the Mouseketeers. Most strikihowever, were the Rin Tin Tin ads, which featurecharacters in full show dress in sets identical toclosely resembling those seen in the actual show, cluding occasional outside establishing shots of Western fort where most of the show's action took place

Among all ads, spot commercials were the mcommon type (42.7%; n=32), but among childreads, 36.7% (n=22) were spots. Of the commerciaimed at adults (n=15), 67% were spot advertisemenHence, we see a clear distinction between ads aimat ad ults and those aimed at children. Spot ads wgenerally well produced because cinematic prodtion, directorial, and editing techniques of the tiwere employed. Two ilm styles prevailed: the Holl


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wood movie classic and the scientific documentary.Ads produced in the Hollywood style featured fami-

lies in daily living routin es, who used the product andexperienced happiness and togetherness because ofthe product's use. Even animated spots emphasized thefamily and/or the pleasure ensuing from product use.

The scientific documentary style ads tjrpically fea-tured only one or two people, with advertised prod-ucts as diverse as automobiles and cereals. The em-phasis was informational rather than emotional. Forexample, One-a-Day vitamins highlighted productattributes in a style closely resembling health educa-tion nims shown in schools. A serious announcervoiceover narrated a script that was more clinicalthan emotional in tone.

Whether integral, segue, or spot approaches wereused to target children in the 60 children's ads, prod-uct details in live ads were often presented in loud,enthusiastic narration or pedantic repetition of sa-lient product attributes. High quality action shotswere often diluted with over-explanation or off-screennarration, which merely provided redu ndant cues forviewers, such a s "Here's a boy eating cereal " (Pep) or'Take a look...Pretty nifty. Huh?" (Ralston cereal).Both examples are evidence of radio's influence ontelevision advertising in its incipient stage. No clear-cut chronological progression is evident during the1950s, but by the mid to late 1960s the audio portionin television ads had become less conspicuous, andvideo and audio m ore often shared importance.

In sum, commercials of the 195 s in programs aimedat the child market show marked distinctions fromcomm ercials of late r decades. Some of the differencesreflect the television technology and technical stan-dards of the 1950s, whereas others illustrate growthin advertis ers' and television executives' unde rstand-ing of the medium as a way to reach specializedchildren's aud iences. Many techniques obviously de-veloped later and will be examined in planned fur-ther study of the evolution of children's television

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