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This article was downloaded by: [Nova Southeastern University]On: 07 October 2014, At: 19:00Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registeredoffice: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
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Editorial: Marketing to ChildrenCaroline Oates a , Mark Blades a & Barrie Gunter aa University of SheffieldPublished online: 19 Mar 2012.
To cite this article: Caroline Oates , Mark Blades & Barrie Gunter (2003) Editorial: Marketing toChildren, Journal of Marketing Management, 19:3-4, 401-409, DOI: 10.1080/0267257X.2003.9728216
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Journal ofMarketing Management 200319, 401-409
Caroline Oates,Mark Blades andBarrie Gunter
University ofSheffield
Editorial: Marketing to Children,
In this spedal issue of the IMM we address the topic ofmarketing to children, a contemporary and oftencontentious field. The debate is of relevance toacademics, practitioners and, policy makers, andtranscends national boundaries. First, an introductionto key areas of the debate is presented, highlightingcurrent concerns and recent industry initiatives. Thenthe five papers in this special edition are introduced,with a brief summary of their contribution to ourunderstanding and development of this wide-rangingand topical issue.
Keywords: children, advertising, consumers
Introduction
In this special edition we address several issues related to marketing tochildren. It is an important and timely topic, not least because children haveimmense spending power. Lawlor and Prothero (2002) cited recent figuresfor the spending power of children aged up to twelve years in the UnitedStates. These children controlled spending of $28 billion in 2000 from theirown allowances and earnings, and in addition they influenced $250 billion offamily spending. The figures for other countries are equally impressive. Forinstance, McNeal and Zhang (2000) estimated that only one fourth of Chinesechildren live in the main cities of China, but these children alone spend over$6 billion of their own money and influence more than' $60 billion of familyspending. A market of this size cannot be ignored, but marketing to childrenraises issues that do not necessarily apply when marketing to adults (Gunterand Furnham 1998).
Much of the marketing aimed at children is via television. Kunkel (2001)suggested that contemporary children in the U.S. may view more than 40,000advertisements every year, and Kunkel and Gantz (1992) found that morethan 10 minutes of every hour of network U.S. television programmes weregiven over to advertising material. Television advertising to children hascome in for much criticism, most of all from countries like Sweden that doesnot allow advertising to under-twelves on its terrestrial television stations.Sweden held the, presidency of the EU in the first six months of 2001 during
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402 Caroline Oates, Mark Blades and Barrie Gunter
which time it raised the possibility of a wider ban on television advertisingaimed at young children. Such a ban would, of course, place seriouslimitations on advertisers' access to the children's market and Britain'smarketing press have strongly defended television advertising to children(e.g. Hanson 2000; Shannon 2000). The launch of Media Smart, a recentadvertising industry initiative, aims to address critics of advertising tochildren by providing an advertising literacy programme to be taught inschools. Launched with the backing of several key advertisers, Media Smartis designed to teach children about advertising and if the scheme issuccessful it will be extended across Europe (Gray 2002). This might help tominimise the threat of future EU legislation aimed at restricting advertisingto children.
Television advertising to children has generated many issues (Macklinand Carlson 1999; Young 1990). Some concerns centre on the types ofproducts that are advertised and the way they are advertised. There areconcerns about how advertising to children is regulated, and there is theissue of how well young children understand the persuasive nature .ofadvertising. .
Approximately, half the television advertisements aimed at children in theU.K. and the U.S. are ones for food (Lewis and Hill 1998; Reece, Rifon andRodriguez 1999). Most food advertising is for cereals, sweets, snacks, otherconvenience foods, and for fast-food outlets. The emphasis on conveniencefoods has led some critics to suggest that this might lead to unhealthy eatinghabits and a lack of a balanced diet (Conner and Armitage 2002; Hammond,Wylie and Casswell 1999). Although marketers have addressed thesecriticisms to some extent by advocating balanced diets and includingnutritional information in food advertisements aimed at children (Reece et aI.1999), this nevertheless leaves the question of whether children understandsuch information.
Other products aimed at children include toys, clothes and entertainmentproducts. Such advertising places an emphasis on possessIons, and onaspiring to a certain life-style (Hahlo 1999). This is especially the case forbranded products where the emphasis is on purchasing not just a product,but a product with a particular label, and as Weller (2002) found, childrencan recognise brands and logos before they can read. Children's desire topossess products they have seen on television is said to lead to 'pesterpower', which means that children pester their parents or other adults to buythings for them (Proctor and Richards 2002). This can be at the level ofchildren negotiating products during family shopping trips - oftensuccessfully from the child's perspective, because, Parker (2001) pointed outthat U.K. parents spend, on average, £7.00more when supermarket shoppingwith children than without them. Pester power can also be more long tenn
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Editorial 403
when children wage' a campaign of requests and demands in advance ofbirthdays and Christmases. For instance, Crouch (1999) found that three·quarters of children had· started asking for Christmas presents beforeOctober. Not surprisingly, children's pestering can lead to family conflictswhen parents refuse to buy the products demanded by their children. But asProctor and Richards (2002) pointed out, television may only be one factor insuch conflict because some children's products sell well with little or noadvertising.
In most countries there are regulations that control television advertisingto children. Such regulations vary greatly between countries (Gunter, Oatesand Blades, in press). In some areas there may be selective bans on particularproducts, for example, in Greece toy advertising is banned at certain times.Some countries (e.g. Belgium and Australia) may limit advertising withinchildren's programmes, or within a few minutes of those programmes, andas we pointed out above other countries like Sweden. ban televisionadvertising aimed at children younger than twelve years of age. The role ofregulation and how restrictive those regulations should be have generatedmuch debate between' those who agree with the views put forward bySweden, and those who consider regulation should be minimal (Furnham2000; Stanbrook 2002).
Countries like the U.K. have a detailed code of practice to regulateadvertisements aimed at children (Independent Television Commission1991). The code is designed to avoid the misleading presentation of productsand may require advertisers to disclose product information. For example,when advertising toys, accurate information about the price,. size, andoperation of the items should be included, though it is not always clear howyoung children interpret such information (Muehling and Kolbe 1999). ' .
To a large extent the type of regulation imposed by a country reflects thatcountry's beliefs about children's' ability to understand the nature ofadvertising. If children were critical viewers and understood the purpose ofadvertising there might be little need to regulate their viewing. Nonetheless,it is generally accepted that young children do not fully appreciate thepersuasive aspect of advertisements, and do not realise that advertisementsmay, because of their nature, give selective or biased presentations ofproducts. Critics have argued that the lack of such awareness in youngchildren may make them unfairly vulnerable to advertising, hence the needfor regulation (Curran and Richards 2000). However, there has been littleagreement· about the age when children achieve a full appreciation ofadvertising with some suggesting that five-year-oIds often have goodunderstanding (Kline 1995) and others arguing that understanding might notalways be achieved. by so~e twelve year oIds (Bjurstrom 1994). In oneexperiment we questIoned siX-year-oIds about the purpose of advertisements
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(Oates, Blades and Gunter 2002). The most frequent responses from thechildren were either that they did not know or that they thoughtadvertisements were to give the viewer or the actors a break. None of thechildren made any reference to the persuasive nature of advertising. As wehave found similar results in other studies we concluded that children havelittle understanding of the purpose of advertisements before six years of age.A full appreciation of television advertising means more than justrecognising persuasive intent and as children get older they develop a moresophisticated understanding of who· pays for' advertisements, who makesthem, who benefits from them, and so on (Oates, Blades, Gunter and Don, inpress).
Although television is the predominant way of. advertising to children,there are many other marketing communications aimed at this audience.These include, for example, marketing via the internet (Clarke 2002), textmessaging Oones 2002), marketing via schools (Rodhain 2002), and licensingchildren's characters (Flack 2001). All these rapidly developing aspects ofmarketing raise issues that are similar to the ones we have mentioned above about children's ability to understand these approaches, and the role ofregulation (Thomas and Dillenbeck 2002). They also raise additionalconcerns. For example, the internet gives children and young people a muchgreater ability to seek out products, which is a benefit for marketers. But ifthe internet also leads to increased pester power, or' children purchasingproducts independently, this may be a concern to parents.
In this special issue we include five studies by researchers who havelooked at various aspects of marketing to children. The first three articles arebroadly concerned with understanding, but the authors take differenttheoretical and methodological approaches., The fourth paper. looks at theparents' perspective in a cross-cultural study, and the final contributioninvestigates the growing trend of internet advertising.
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Papers in the Special Issue ., "
In the first paper Lawlor and' Prothero provide a useful review of theliterature on' understanding; and discuss the issue of children'scomprehension of television advertising. In their study they' interviewedeight and nine-year-oIds in Ireland to find, out how they differentiatedtelevision advertisements from programmes, how they interpretedadvertising, and whether they thought that advertisements were trying topersuade them to buy. The children also discussed other issues like celebrityendorsement of products and wider concepts such as the role of advertisingin funding programmes. The children also made comments on whether theythought advertisements were entertaining or intrusive. This paper, therefore,
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goes beyond narrow measures of children's understanding and considers thecomplexity and richness of children's interpretation of television advertising
Bartholomew and O'Donohoe present another qualitative study, this timebased on individual interviews, focus groups and photo diaries. They talkedto ten- to twelve-year-olds in Scotland about their attitudes towards and theirinterpretation of different advertisements. Many of the children were able tooffer detailed evaluations of - the content and structure of televisionadvertisements. This critical awareness often -reflected a sophisticatedunderstanding of advertising concepts. Bartholomew and Q'Donohoe wentbeyond just asking children about advertisements they had seen and askedthem how they would market an imaginary soft drink. In this way thechildren were successfully encouraged to apply the knowledge they hadgained from watching advertising to the task of designing a noveladvertisement.-, '
Pine and Veasey also investigated understanding of marketing conceptsbut in children as young as four. They questioned children about selfpromotion by asking them what sort of statements they would make toconvince a teacher that they were capable of carrying out a particular task.The children were also asked to judge how effective different selfpromotional statements might be, and in another task, to predict the sort ofmessage that a character in an advertisement might make. In this way Pineand Veasey were able to develop original means to measure children'sawareness of promotion and to describe age-related differences in theirunderstanding of this concept.
The paper by Young, de Bruin and Eagle includes a survey of parents inthree countries (U.K., Sweden, and New Zealand). Young et a1. asked parentsabout many of the concerns that have been voiced with regard to advertisingaimed at children. These included the effects of advertising on children'sproduct choices, whether advertising leads to family discussion or conflict,the honesty of advertisements, and the effects of specific advertising, such asfood products, on children's lifestyle. Young et a1. found that many parentswere concerned about the number of advertisements seen by children,especially as they believed that children might be encouraged to wantproducts they did not really need. There was a feeling that advertising ledchildren to pester their parents to buy things for them; a concern that youngchildren might not fully understand the intent of advertising; and a beliefthat advertising regulation was not sufficient. But there were only modestconcerns about food advertising aimed at children. This paper is one of thefew studies that has made comparisons of attitudes to advertising acrosscultures and is important in highlighting the similarities and differences inparents' concerns in different countries.
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The final paper, by Thomson and Laing, considers the effects of internetadvertising on families. Thomson and, Laing interviewed parents' andchildren about how the children used the internet to search out informationabout products, and what sort of products they wanted to buy. In theseinterviews the families discussed the convenience, opportunities, andadvantages of purchasing over the internet. The interviews also consideredthe disadvantages of internet shopping, in particular, the practical difficultiesof children paying for purchases over the internet. Some of the' youngerchildren did not have the consumer skills necessary to appreciate all theimplications of internet buying or the potential complications of orderingproducts from other countries. Nonetheless, there was a general recognitionthat the internet had the potential to help the development of children asconsumers in their own right.
We believe this set of papers provides a contemporary and critical look atmany aspects of marketing to children. We hope this special issue will notonly be an effective resource for readers interested in marketing to children,but will also serve as a starting point for more informed debate about thisoften contentious area of marketing.
References
Bjurstr6m, E. (1994), Children and television advertising. A critical study ofinternational research concerning the effects of TV commercials on children,Vallingby, Sweden, Konsumentvertket
Clarke, J. (2002), "The internet according to kids", International Journal ofAdvertising and Marketing to Children, 3(2), pp,45-52'
Conner, M. and Armitage, C. J. (2002), The social psychology of food,Buckingham, U.K., Open University Press I
Crouch, C. (1999), "Case study - GMTV competing for children", InternationalJournal ofAdvertising and Marketing to Children, 1(1), pp. 37-42
Curran, C. M. and Richards, J. I. (2000),· "The regulation of children'sadvertising in the US", Internationallournal ofAdvertising and Marketing toChildren, 2(2), pp.139-154
Flack, J. (2001), "Who calls the toon?", Marketing Week, 28th June, pp.75-77Fumham, A. (2000), Children and advertising. The allegations and the evidence,
London, Social Affairs UnitGray, R. (2002), "Powerful start for Media Smart", Marketing, 21st November;
p.15Gunter, B. and Fumham, A. (1998), Children as consumers. A psychological
analysis ofthe young people's market, London, Routledge . .Gunter, B., Oates, C. and Blades, M. (in press), Advertising to children on TV:
Content, impact and regulation, Mahwah, New Jersey, Erlbaum
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Hammond, K M., Wylie, A. and Casswell, S. (1999), ,"The extent and natureof television food advertising to New Zealand children and adolescents",Australian and New Zealand Journal ofPublic Health, 23, pp.49-55 '
Hanson, M; (2000), "Banning' ads for kids stops open communication";Marketing 20th April, p.22 .
Independent Television Commission (1991),. The' Independent' Television',Commission code of advertising standards and practice, London, Independent,Television Commission
Jones, A. (2002), "Wireless marketing: the linking value of text messaging",I International Journal ofAdvertising and Marketing to Children, 3(2), pp.39-44Kline, S. (1995), Out of the garden. Toys and children's culture in the age of TV
marketing/London, Verso, 'Kunkel, D. (2001), "Children and television advertising", In: Singer, D.G. and
Singer, J.L. (Eds.), Handbook of children and the media, 'Thousand Oaks,, California, Sage I
Kunkel, D. and Gantz, W. (1992), "Children's television advertising in themulti-channel environment", Journal ofCommunication, 42, pp.134:'152
Lawlor, M-A. and Prothero, A. (2002)" "The established and potentialmediating variables in the child's understanding of advertising intent:
,, Towards a research agenda," Journal ofMarketing Management, 18, pp.481499
Lewis, M.K. and Hill, A.J. (1998), "Food advertising on British children'stelevision: a content analysis and experimental study with nine-yearolds", International Journal ofObesity, 22, pp.206-214
Macklin, M.e. and Carlson, L. (Eds.) (1999), Advertising to children. Conceptsand controversies, Thousand Oaks, California, Sage '
McNeal, J. U. and Zhang, H. (2000), "Chinese children's consumer behaviour:,A review", International Journal of Advertising and Marketing to Children,2(1), pp.31-37
Muehling, D. D. and Kolbe, R. H. (1999), "A comparison of children's andprime-time fine print advertising disclosure practices", In: Macklin, M.e.and Carlson, L. (Eds.), Advertising to children. Concepts and controversies,Thousand Oaks, California, Sage
Oates, e., Blades, M. and Gunter, B. (2002), "Children and televisionadvertising: When do they understand persuasive intent?", Journal of
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Proctor, J; and Richards, M. (2002), "Word-of-mouth marketing: beyondpester power", International Journal ofAdvertising and Marketing to Children,3(3), pp.3-11
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About the Authors
Caroline Oates is Lecturer in Marketing in the Management School,University of Sheffield. She holds a first degree in social policy from theUniversity of Sheffield, an M.Sc. in marketing from Sheffield HallamUniversity and a Ph.D. from the University of Sheffield. Her main researchinterests include marketing to children, and environmental marketing.Caroline is a member of.the Centre for the Study of Childhood and Youth,based at the University of Sheffield. She has published in journals such asJournal of Consumer Behaviour, Popular Culture Review, Journal of MarketingCommunications, and Self, Agency and Society.
Mark Blades is Senior Lecturer in Developmental Psychology in theDepartment of Psychology at the University of Sheffield. He has a degree inarchaeology and anthropology from the University of Cambridge and adegree in psychology from the University of Sheffield where he alsocompleted a Ph.D. in child development. He has carried out research into
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children's environmental knowledge, children's memory abilities andchildren's ability to give accurate testimony in court. He has publishedseveral books on children's development including, most recently, Smith,P.K, Cowie, H. and Blades, M. (2003), Understanding children's development,Fourth edition, Oxford: Blackwell.
Barrie Gunter is Professor of Journalism Studies, Department of JournalismStudies, University of Sheffield. He has degrees in psychology from theUniversity of Wales (B.Sc.(Hons.) 1975), University of London (M.Sc. 1976)and University of East London (ph.D 1980). He has written 45 books andover 200 other publications on a variety of media and marketing topics. Hismain research interests are impact of advertising, media violence, and use ofnew media.
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