Children’s Perceptions of Advertising

Sandy Bulmer

Department of Commerce, Massey University at Albany, Auckland, New ZealandTelephone: 64-9-443-9799 ext 9595Facsimile: 64-9-441-8177Email: s.l.bulmer@massey.ac.nz

Abstract:

This paper reports the findings of focus group research conducted to gauge theperceptions of 5 - 8 year old children regarding television advertising. Four age groupcohorts were studied separately to determine what children at each age level perceiveadvertising is and the purpose it serves. The development of an understanding of thecommercial intent of ads was compared between the age groups. Children were alsoinvited to comment about whether they like advertisements and whether ads makechildren want (and ask their parents for) products. Results showed that five and six yearolds found television advertising informative and entertaining. By the age of seven manychildren perceived that advertising was an intrusion to programming. Almost all eightyear olds had an understanding of the commercial intent and advocatory nature ofadvertising. They could apply this knowledge and critically evaluate advertisements.Subsequently they were more sceptical than younger children about claims made inadvertising.

Department of Commerce,Massey University, Auckland

WORKING PAPER SERIESNo. 01.05

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Introduction

This research is part of a series of papers designed to inform debate about children andadvertising issues. The research is intended to contribute towards a better understandingof how children view advertising and the wider media world. It is our belief that theresearch will go a considerable way towards not only learning about the perspective ofNew Zealand children but also informing future policy making in this area.

The question of how children cope with persuasive messages is of concern to manyparents when their offspring are first exposed to children’s television advertising. (Note:The self-regulated industry does not allow any advertising in programmes aimed atchildren under 5 years – see: Advertising Standards Authority, 1989). Typical criticismsare that advertising makes false claims, promotes materialism and other undesirablevalues as well as exploiting vulnerable and disadvantaged children (Rose, Bush & Kahle,1998). As well as viewing advertising in the traditional media, children are exposed toadvertising when they visit commercial websites eg < www.yowiepower.com>. At thesesites they may have opportunities to see interstitial and banner advertisements that appearon screen and invite the viewer to click on an icon to obtain further information.

Public debate about the effects of advertising on children has increased since the NewZealand Labour Party (1999) announced its policy recommendation of banningadvertising during children’s television programmes. On the one hand there are world-wide claims that children are becoming more media ‘savvy’ - see for example Mycek(1999) and Lippe (2001). A typical point of view, cited by Lippe, is that “by age six, theaverage child will have seen 190,000 television commercials; the mind changes whenyou've been exposed to one million [sales] messages. You learn how to tell truth fromfalsehood.” On the other hand there is a strong perception that advertisers of children’sproducts are taking advantage of the vulnerable and harnessing so-called ‘pester power’.Marketing encourages children to pester parents, siblings and grandparents to part with

their money. Children increasingly exercise their pester power by offering to help aroundthe house, for example, or by making parents feel guilty for spending less time withthem.” (Killgren & Moosa, 1999). What is missing from this public policy discussion isevidence of how children actually cope with advertising - how much they understand andutilise knowledge about advertisers’ persuasion techniques.

Today’s children appear to have sophisticated responses to television and seem confidentusing and interacting with computer technologies. Twenty-five years ago Griffin (1976)observed that young children conditioned by television had become more cognitivelyadvanced than their predecessors were. Despite becoming more ‘cognitively savvy’ shenoted that their emotional development had not altered in the same way. What this meansis that children may have more experience and exposure to advertising but they are stillnot entirely resistant to it. Nevertheless there are few academic studies that account forthe impact of increased media consumption on children’s responses to advertising.

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A large proportion of the consumer research literature is based on studies of adults. Thisis due in part to the practical and ethical problems of studying children. Anotherexplanation is that sophisticated cognitive processes, which are not fully developed inchildren, underpin many consumption behaviours. Children and adolescents are nowperceived as having significant spending power and influence in family purchasedecisions (Boush, Friestad & Rose, 1994). It follows that marketing communicators,policy makers and researchers should try to understand the advertising issues relating tochildren before they reach cognitive and emotional maturity.

Children And Advertising: Early Research

In the early 1970’s when the US Federal Trade Commission began to draw up guidelinesto protect children from unscrupulous advertising, the lack of research into children’sadvertising issues fuelled a political controversy. In an attempt to regulate the industrypolicy advisors required answers to the following key questions (Griffin, 1976):

• To what degree does advertising influence children?• How do children’s perceptions of advertising alter with age?• At what stage can children resist or discard an intended commercial message?

This spawned a stream of research - notably Goldberg & Gorn, 1974; Robertson &Rossiter, 1974; Gorn & Goldberg, 1980; Baron & Bernard, 1982; Barling & Fullagar,1983; (See Table 1).

Table 1. Typical early research into children and advertising. STUDY TOPIC AGE RANGE FINDINGS

Goldberg &Gorn (1974)

Extent that TVcommercials motivatechildren to acquireitems

8 - 10 years Single exposure to anad can lead tomotivated behaviour

Robertson &Rossiter(1974)

Persuasive intent ofcommercials

Threecategories from5 - 10 years

If persuasive intent isattributed to an adthen child believesand likes ads less andis less likely to wantproduct

Gorn &Goldberg(1980)

Effects of repetitive TVad viewing

8 - 10 years Repeated exposureleads to increasedpreference andbehaviour

Baron &Bernard(1982)

Perceptions of time Eight agecategories from4 - 13 years

Understanding of TVproductiontechniques increaseswith age

Barling &Fullagar(1983)

Attitudes to televisionadvertising

x = 10.67 years Age related transitionfrom Entertainmentto Irritation /Boredom

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The findings of these and other studies were summarised by Kunkel & Roberts (1991)who noted the following conclusions:

• Children below 5 years frequently do not distinguish between programmes andcommercials

• Children cannot distinguish between fantasy and reality on television until earlyschool years

• Below age 8 children express virtually no comprehension of persuasive intentionsof advertising

• As children come to understand commercial intent they become more scepticaland distrusting of advertising claims, using their knowledge as a sort of cognitivedefence mechanism.

In a meta-analysis of children’s understanding of the intent of advertising Martin (1997)distinguishes between informational intent and persuasive intent. She notes that televisionadvertisements are perceived to have an entertainment function, an assistive/ teachingfunction or a selling/persuasive function. In general, research has been undertaken toanswer particular policy/practitioner problems in two major categories:

1. Cognitive processes activated as a result of watching and listening to advertisingand

2. What the child does with the information processed. However, the underlying theory of how children process information and respond toadvertising was a little vague in the early studies. Since the early findings were published, Wright (1980) proposed that measures ofverbalised message-evoked thoughts could more accurately determine what consumersthink during persuasion. More recently Friestad & Wright (1994) proposed a model ofhow a person’s knowledge of persuasion attempts helps them cope and respond toadvertising, personal negotiations and other advocacy situations. The Persuasion Knowledge Model

Existing ‘adult’ persuasion theories (see Petty et al, 1991) represent how ‘topic’ attitudesare developed and refined. The persuasion knowledge model (PKM) proposed byFriestad & Wright (1994) explains how consumers recognise, interpret, evaluate,remember and respond to persuasive techniques. They describe persuasion knowledge asfollows:

“Persuasion knowledge performs schema-like functions, such as

guiding consumers’ attention to aspects of an advertising campaign…providing inferences about possible background conditions…generating predictions about the likely effects on people… andevaluating its overall competence.”

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Friestad & Wright (1994) conceptualised persuasion knowledge as a resource that peoplemust have access to in order to recognise and manage a persuasion attempt. They submitthat consumer coping behaviour is contingent on three different knowledge structures -(1) persuasion knowledge (2) agent knowledge and (3) topic knowledge. In their modelthe agent is conceptualised as the ‘persuader’- usually the advertiser in the marketingcontext. The ‘topic’ is the advertising message topic. Although agent knowledge andtopic knowledge are important factors, a discussion of these concepts in relation tochildren is beyond the scope of this review. Friestad & Wright (1994) made a number of fundamental assumptions about the PKM.

• People try to maintain control during a persuasion attempt• The degree to which people access their persuasion knowledge will vary

during an episode• Responses reflect the psychological activities they can perceive they can

control• People are motivated to hold a valid and justifiable attitude.

Up to the age of seven or so a child’s behaviour and thinking is ego-centric (Piaget, citedin Wadsworth, 1984:81). Until children reach a stage when they perceive that otherpeople may have different agendas to their own, their responses are entirely self-centred.That is, they do not reflect on their own responses or question the actions of others. Forthis reason the assumptions in the PKM may not be entirely valid for children. Persuasion knowledge depends on the maturation of some basic cognitive skills and onpeoples’ accumulated experience. Acquisition of cultural ‘common sense’ aboutpersuasion tactics is an on-going process (Friestad & Wright, 1999). The authors notedthat persuasion knowledge is a type of folk-wisdom dependent not so much on theindividual but on the society in which they live. Folk-wisdom evolves over time andtakes into account recent experiences. Beliefs such as these are rooted within a cultureand may be expected to vary according to social and ethnic differences. Societies thathave had less exposure to a medium may be more naive with respect to advertisingpersuasion knowledge. Piaget’s Theory Of Cognitive And Affective Development

The stages of child development have been reported extensively in the educationliterature with reference to the seminal work of Piaget (Wadsworth, 1984). Childrenbetween the ages of 2 and 7 develop spoken language and are increasingly able to think.Logical thought is impeded by an inability to see another viewpoint, to followtransformations or to ‘see outside the square’. During the stage of concrete operations(age 7 - 11) children can make judgements based on reasoning. They can apply ‘1-looprecursive thinking’- e.g. interpreting why a character in a TV ad behaved in a particularway (Paget, Kritt & Bergmann, 1984). As children become adolescents they becomemore cognitively mature and are able to solve complex verbal and hypothetical problems.At this stage they can use ‘2-loop recursive thinking’ - they become aware of strategicinteractions and the effects of tactics on others (Paget et al, 1984).

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Brucks, Armstrong & Goldberg (1988) found that although earlier researchers hadestablished that most 8 year olds understand selling intent, this in itself does notguarantee resistance to persuasive appeals. Brucks et al. (1988) also reported that 9 - 10year olds can generate negative thoughts about an advertisement but they do notnecessarily generate negative thoughts about the product. Similarly, Roedder (1981)reported that children aged 8 - 12 years cannot usually generate critical responses and donot have the skills to detect inconsistencies in advertising messages. Her researchsuggested that until the age of twelve children use stored information only whenprompted (Brucks et al, 1988) and do not have well developed techniques for coping withpersuasive messages. Until a child spontaneously recognises that persuasion techniquesare being used he/she is more uncritical of advertising messages.

It would seem likely that children do not, indeed cannot generate counter-arguments untillater years. The responses of young school-age children may be simple affectiveresponses like behaviourally conditioned responses. As children grow older, simpleschema develop and become increasingly rich and complex as they accumulateexperiences. Once they develop critical skills they use schema in a much more complexway, more like an adult. The cognitive responses that may occur, especially in olderchildren, are counter-arguments, support arguments and source derogation (Wright, citedin Brucks et al, 1988).

Advertising as a product to be consumed

Children learn to consume advertising and research suggests that they becomeincreasingly sceptical of advertising claims as they approach adolescence (Mangleburg& Bristol, 1998). At a young age children appear to treat advertising as entertainment andas a significant source of information. They may judge commercials solely on this basis.Ethnographic studies also provide support for the proposition that advertisements, inthemselves, are an item for consumption – see, for example, Ritson & Elliot (1999).Consumers use the shared language of advertising as a means of common understanding;advertising has social currency.

The existing research body has a number of limitations. Firstly, much of the research issome 15 years old and hence does not take into account the influence of new electronicmedia forms. Secondly, it is a question of judgement whether studies that arepredominantly American and British in origin are generalisable to the New Zealandsituation. Our research is designed to determine how well New Zealand children in thefive to eight year age group understand selling intent – i.e. the children who, according tothe perceptions of policy makers, are most vulnerable to advertising.

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Methodological Issues

The research methodology is critical in this study of children at varying stages ofcognitive and verbal development. Young, van der Valk & Prat (1997) advised againstthe use of direct interview methodology and suggested that children younger than 7 – 8years do not understand advocacy communication but that “many of the young childrenare capable of understanding the advocacy functions of advertising when the material ispresented in a concrete way with minimal linguistic input”. Young et al. (1997) usedvisual aids rather than relying on writing or language based investigation techniques tostudy advocacy in children’s advertising.

There have been many criticisms (see Macklin, 1987; Brucks et al. 1988) of the methodsused by early researchers such as Robertson & Rossiter (1974). The use of non-directiveprobes rather than direct questioning (particularly one-on-one interviewing) appears tohave strong support among researchers in this area (see, e.g. Brucks et al., 1988). In theirstudy of 9 to 10 year olds, Brucks et al. (1988) examined cognitive responses totelevision advertising and found that the process of asking direct questions acts as aprompt and generates additional responses that do not reflect children’s ‘normal’thoughts. Such techniques may overstate the true response in a real-life television-viewing context.

Brucks et al. (1988) contend that children under the age of 8 years do not have thecognitive capacity to use sophisticated information storage and retrieval strategies toanalyse and criticise advertising and, far less, the ability to articulate the strategies used incritical analysis. This is consistent with Piaget’s developmental stages (see, e.g. John,1999) where children’s development can be classified into three stages:

1. ‘Limited processors’: under 8 years of age, who use simple informationprocessing strategies

2. ‘Cued processors’: 8 – 12 year olds who may use stored information andretrieval strategies to process information when prompted

3. ‘Strategic processors’: 13 years and older who can generate spontaneous criticalcognitive responses.

Given the desire to focus on children under the age of 8, the cognitive approach wouldappear to be ineffective for this group. Indeed, this appears to have been conceded bymost researchers currently active in this field. Therefore, although there are severalpossible methodological approaches to studying children suggested by the literature, onlyone would appear suitable for the five to eight year age groups.

Using the indirect group interview approach, this research focuses on the followingaspects;

• The information value / commercial intent of advertising• The entertainment / boredom value of advertising

This is the approach and agenda favoured by Young et al. (1997), which is also indirectlyendorsed by John (1999) in her comprehensive review of the literature relating to thesocialisation of children with respect to advertising responses.

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Research Objectives

The research aims are to specifically determine:§ At what age children understand the advocacy/persuasive intent of advertising

(what it is, why it is there, where you find it, what is good about/bad about it)§ At what age children critically evaluate the advertising that they watch§ At what age television advertising is perceived as entertainment, informationally

orientated or irritating/boring§ Whether seeing advertised products makes children

a) Want those products, andb) Whether they then ask their parents for the products they have seen

Methodology

Seventy-four children aged from five to eight years were recruited from two schools inmetropolitan Auckland. A mid-decile state school and a decile-10 private school wereselected for this study. Approval was gained for this project from the Principals of bothschools and, via them, from the Boards of Trustees. Parents were sent a letter from theuniversity researchers outlining the objectives of the study and guaranteeingconfidentiality for all respondents. It was stressed that there would be no ramificationsshould parents elect to not permit their children to participate. It was also stressed thatonly the aggregate results would be used and that no individual child or theirparent/caregiver would be able to be identified. A covering letter from the Principalendorsed the study and asked for parental cooperation. Formal written parental/caregiverconsent was required before the research proceeded.

Parental consent was obtained at both schools for approximately 10 children in each agegroup to participate in a focus group discussion conducted in the school environment.Each focus group session comprised children of the same age, usually from a singleclassroom. The principal researcher conducted the series of structured discussion groupswith help from a research assistant who made detailed notes about the children’sparticipation and reactions to each question.

In the first part of each session introductions were made and children were encouraged tothink about their own opinions of television viewing. However, the questions were notdirected at individuals but posed for the whole group to consider. Individuals respondedonly when they chose to. Preliminary questions were asked such as: Do you likewatching TV sometimes? What are your favourite television programmes? And do youhave favourite TV commercials or advertisements? The researcher then asked keyquestions such as: Tell me what advertising is; what is it for? Why are commercialsshown on TV?; Do you like advertisements? (Why / why not?); Do you talk to yourfriends about advertisements? (Why / why not?); Do you talk to your family aboutadvertisements? (Why / why not?); Do advertisements make you want the products yousee? Do you ask your parents to buy these products for you?

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In the second part of the session each group was then shown a range of contemporaryadvertisements embedded in a typical piece of current children’s programming. Oneminute of cartoon programme content was shown, followed by a ‘normal’ style ofcommercial break comprising six advertisements in 3½ minutes. The segment ofadvertisements included a programme trailer for a children’s movie to be shown in theweekend, a commercial for a recently launched confectionery brand, other advertisementsfor toys and a competition jointly run by a television channel and a cereal manufacturer.This was followed by a further 1¼ minutes of the cartoon programme.

After each group had viewed the material they were asked to think about a particularadvertisement that had been screened. They were then asked to comment on what it wasabout, what it was saying and what it wants children to do. This process was repeatedwith one other advertisement in the commercial break. To eliminate any order bias, thetwo selected advertisements were discussed in alternating order with each group.

All sessions were recorded on audiotape. Subsequently each entire discussion wastranscribed and annotated with any relevant information not captured on audiotape. It wasfelt that videotaping the sessions, while appealing in terms of the richness of dataobtained, would present privacy concerns for parents, caregivers and the children’steachers. Videotaping would also have been a distraction for the participating children.

The transcripts were analysed and all responses were categorised and coded by theprincipal researcher. The research assistant checked this work so that agreement on allresponse types was reached.

Results

The first part of each focus group session was designed to evaluate children’s knowledgeof advertising or persuasion knowledge (see Friestad and Wright, 1994). The three-partquestion was designed to stimulate as many responses as possible to determine the extentto which children comprehend the advocatory nature of television advertising. Allresponses were classified according to type - the main types of comments have beenparaphrased. The purposes of advertising were categorised as informational, commercial,entertainment or ‘don’t know’. The total number of evoked responses for each type andfor each category was recorded. The combined score of the three questions is a measureof the total evoked response for each response type and category.

The results from the two schools were combined – there were no significant differencesbetween them except that the children from one school consistently gave a greaternumber of spontaneous responses. This was attributed to the marked differences betweeneach schools’ culture, rules and expectations of classroom behaviour. This differencebetween schools did not affect the analysis of results because the focus was on relativeproportions of types of responses rather than absolute numbers.

Initial analysis of responses regarding what advertising is, what it is for and why it isshown suggested that there were very few differences between five year old and six year

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old children’s persuasion knowledge. All the results for the five and six year age groupswere aggregated for this reason. The classified responses for the age groups are tabledbelow.

Table 2. Combined evoked responses for five and six year old perceptions of thepurposes of television advertising.

Five & Six Year Olds’Comments

What isadvertising?% responses

What is it for?

% responses

Why are adsshown?

% responses

TOTAL% responses

INFORMATIONAL 86Gives information /news

31 46 50 38

Tells you about TVprogrammes

31 27 0 28

Tells you about things tobuy

13 9 0 10

Tells what is new in theshops

13 0 0 7

Tells how muchproducts cost

6 0 0 3

ENTERTAINMENT 7To entertain you 0 0 50 4Songs and jingles 6 0 0 3DON’T KNOW 0 18 0 7TOTAL 100 % 100% 100% 100%

(n=29)The responses above show that none of the children in the five and six year old age groupdemonstrated understanding of the commercial motivations of advertisers. They appearedto believe that advertising was shown mainly for information purposes by way of a‘public service’. Although they did mention buying, product pricing and retailing, thefive and six year olds did not attribute this to any agenda on the part of the advertiser.This is entirely consistent with the Piagetian cognitive development theory (seeWadsworth, 1984:147) that suggests young children do not perceive the motivations ofothers because they cannot construct new knowledge through reflective thinking alone.

Some of the seven-year-old children spontaneously identified commercial motivationsdriving advertising and these comments accounted for almost forty-four percent of thetotal responses in this section. These children described not only the informationprovided by the television advertisements but the reason why the information was there.Seven-year-old children at both schools described the advertiser’s motivations and thecommercial consequences in simple terms. The researchers perceived that approximatelyhalf of the seven year olds realised that advertisers employ television advertising for theirown purposes. However the scope of the research was such that it was not possible tomeasure, with any statistical significance, the percentage of children who identifiedcommercial intentions.

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Table 3. Evoked responses from seven year olds’- perceptions of the purpose oftelevision advertising.

Seven Year Olds’Comments

What isadvertising?% responses

What is it for?

% responses

Why are adsshown?

% responses

TOTAL% responses

INFORMATIONAL 53Tells you about TVprogrammes

17 0 50 25

Gives information 17 13 8 13Gives information aboutproducts that is not alwaysimpartial

0 12 0 3

Tells people what isavailable

0 0 8 3

Tells how much productscost

8 0 0 3

Tells what is new in theshops

8 0 0 3

Gives specific product useinstructions

0 13 0 3

COMMERCIAL 44Gets you to buy things 25 12 0 13Gets you to want things 9 0 0 3Intends to get money fromyou

0 38 0 9

Gets you to go to aparticular shop / location

16 0 9 10

Funds programming / TVstation activities

0 12 0 3

Supplements ads in othermedia

0 0 17 6

DON’T KNOW 0 0 8 3TOTAL 100% 100% 100% 100%

(n=32)

By eight years of age almost all children seemed to have some concept of the multi-stageprocess of supply chains and believe that profit is the desired result of most advertising.There were elaborate explanations of the commercial motivations of advertisers. Thesechildren also understood that advertising devices are used to enhance persuasion andmotivate desires and buying behaviour. Typical examples of eight-year-old children’sexplanations of the purpose of television advertising, based on the three questions in thissection, are given below.

“Getting people to come to your shop and get them to give you so much money to buygroceries and stuff, and get so rich that you can buy anything you want”.

“To get you to buy the products so that people in shops get paid”.“They tell you about movies and programmes even before you can see them so that you

get really interested”.

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Table 4. Evoked responses from eight year olds’- perceptions of the purpose oftelevision advertising.

Eight Year Olds’ Comments What isadvertising?% responses

What is it for?

% responses

Why are adsshown?

% responses

TOTAL% responses

COMMERCIAL 68Gives information aboutproducts that is not alwaysimpartial

0 38 0 20

Gets you interested so you willwant to buy

0 8 20 8

Makes you want to buy so thatmoney can be made

0 0 40 8

Intends to get money from you 0 8 0 4Intends to make money formanufacturers

0 0 20 4

Gets you to buy things 14 0 0 4Makes you buy so that shopworkers get paid

0 0 20 4

Gets you to buy more 0 8 0 4Gets you to want things 14 0 0 4Funds programming / TVstation activities

0 8 0 4

Has the same purpose asprogramme & eventsponsorship

0 8 0 4

INFORMATIONAL 32Tells you about TVprogrammes

14 15 0 12

Gives information 14 7 0 8Tells what is new in the shops 14 0 0 4Tells you about things to do 15 0 0 4Tells you about things to buy 15 0 0 4TOTAL 100% 100% 100% 100%

(n=25)

The data in the three tables above show that the relative importance of each category ofresponse varies between ages. Differences between and within age groups are veryapparent. It is clear that perceptions of the purpose of advertising change considerablyover the five to eight year old developmental period. By the age of eight children beganto acquire knowledge of the commercial intent of television advertising. They wereincreasingly able to understand that advertisers have a motive for running advertisementson television. Comparisons of the responses types within and between age groups areillustrated in the two graphs below.

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Graph 1. Comparison of the perceived purposes of television advertising within agegroups - measured as a percentage of total evoked responses.

0102030405060708090

5 and 6years

7 years 8 years

Ages

Perceptions of the purpose of television advertising

Info Commerce

Entertain

Don't know

Graph 2. Comparison of perceived purposes of television advertising between agegroups - measured as a percentage of total evoked responses.

Purposes of TV advertising compared between 5/6, 7 and 8 year olds

0

20

40

60

80

100

Info Commerce Entertain Don't know

5 and 6 years 7 years 8 years

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The differences between age groups were even more obvious in the responses toquestions about liking television advertisements. All spontaneous responses to the groupquestion about liking advertisements were recorded. These were summarised for each agegroup and categorised as either positive or negative in the table below.

Table 5. Liking of television advertising. Responses Five & Six year

olds% responses

Seven year olds% responses

Eight year olds% responses

TOTAL POSITIVE COMMENTS 95 40 33Yes 65 25 14Yes -especially like funny ads 25 10 10Yes - gives me new ideas (about products)

5 0 0

Yes - provides occasion for drink /loo break

0 5 5

Yes - can be a convenient timeto turn TV off

0 0 4

TOTAL NEGATIVE COMMENTS 5 60 67No 5 15 0No - over-hyped claims 0 0 29No - interrupts programme 0 25 19No - takes too long / wastes programmetime

0 5 5

No – fast forward video to avoid them 0 5 0No – can be very boring 0 5 0Usually use the mute button 0 5 0Don't like some that are very stupid 0 0 14GRAND TOTAL 100% 100% 100%

(n=20) (n=19) (n=22)

Younger children’s perspectives on television advertising were virtually all positive(ninety-five percent). Typical comments from this age group are:

“(I like TV ads because) they tell you what you can buy and it might be coolI like funny ads”.

“I remember things on TV and it gives me ideas”.

In contrast sixty percent of seven year old comments were negative, with explanationssolely about programme interruption.

“Some are really a pain because they interrupt the programmes at good parts and youhave to wait”.

“I don’t like it when the ads come on in a good or funny part of the programme”.“When I am trying to watch something that I want to see and the ads come on and they

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The negative trend was even more pronounced in the eight-year-old category with sixty-seven percent of comments being negative. These children elaborated on their negativefeelings of wasted time and displayed a deeper knowledge of advertising practices andproduct claims, frequently making reference to puffery and bias in advertising claims, forexample:

“(Cereal brand) is not as good as the ad says they are. They are just normal cerealcovered in sugar”.

“The (cleaning product) did not do what the ad said it would do”.“I don’t like the (soft drink brand) ad where the polar bear drinks it. It’s not true

Some ads seem to be for the same products. I do not like it when the ads are copied fromother ads”.

“They advertise like 20% off but that’s not true. Sometimes they advertise 20% off whenit’s actually 5% off – not as much as they say on the TV

Although children in all of the age cohorts agreed that there are some very funny andentertaining commercials on television (three current advertisements were cited by anumber of children), overall liking of advertising was markedly different between the twoolder and two younger age groups. As the children developed more cognitive skills theyevaluated more critically, using different criteria.

The focus groups were asked whether children talk to friends about advertisements thatthey see on television. This question did not prompt much discussion amongst the groupsof seven and eight year olds. Likewise, the question of whether children talk to theirfamily about advertisements did not elicit as many responses as other parts of theresearch session. The results from these two questions are tabled below.

Table 6. Talking to others about advertisements on television – percentageresponses per age group.

Five & six year oldResponses

%

Seven year oldResponses

%

Eight year oldResponses

%Talking to friends about adsYes 0 100 25No 100 0 75TOTAL 100% 100% 100%

Talking to family about adsYes – for clarification aboutspecific details

33 0 20

Yes - ad execution isconversation topic

50 80 40

Yes - prompts a purchaserequest/or permission to watchTV

17 20 20

No 0 0 20TOTAL 100% 100% 100%

(n=6) (n=5) (n=5)

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There were surprising responses to the question about talking to friends aboutadvertisements. The groups of five and six year olds answered en masse and wereunanimous in their verdict. They were emphatic that children did not talk with friendsabout advertisements seen on television. However, during the course of the focus groupsa number of spontaneous conversations sprang up concerning commercials that childrenhad seen and it was obvious that these conversations had happened at other times. Oneinterpretation of this negative response arises from the understanding that youngerchildren perceived advertisements to be informational. Five and six year olds may nothave discussed the information per se. However they did discuss the ‘coolness’ of certainproducts, actors or characters and their reactions to the humour in advertisements.

Although there were relatively few responses, seven and eight year olds admitted totalking about advertisements with their friends. It was clear from the general discussionin these groups that knowledge of newly advertised products was powerful culturalcurrency. Children that had seen certain advertisements were in a position to judge whatwas cool and what was not. Ritson & Elliot (1999) described this phenomenon, whereparticipation in group conversation was limited by non-exposure to advertising. Thetopics of spontaneous discussion in our focus groups are illustrated below. They rangedfrom details about advertised products,

“The new (computer game) costs a lot. It is awesome”,to comparisons between advertising claims and personal experience with the product,

“They (animated toys) are annoying. They woke my sister up because hers kepttalking. They are not that good”,

and favourite advertisements that are humorous,“I like the (energy drink) ad when the beetle goes through the car windscreen”.

This latter statement was followed by gales of laughter, agreement and elaboration by thegroup about the details of the storyline.

There were few responses to the question posed to the group about whether childrendiscuss advertisements with family members. There were no observable differencesbetween the age groups. Communication with parents reportedly took the form of eitherquestions about the product or event being advertised, requests to buy / permission towatch trailered programmes or discussion about the entertainment provided by acommercial.

The final topic in the first section of the focus groups was whether advertisements madechildren want things and ask their parents for them. There were no differences betweenthe responses of the different age cohorts. Children in all age groups, even the youngestones, asserted that advertisements make you want things. The results indicate that by agefive, children had at least a simplistic comprehension of the influence that televisionadvertising has had in forming their own desires. Whilst older children became moresceptical about advertising claims, they still perceived that advertisements couldinfluence them.

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Similarly, children of all ages reported that they ask parents for the things that they seeadvertised. Many children commented that this was usually futile, as parents “always sayno”. Some older children also noted that they have to decide whether or not to use theirown money to buy new toys advertised on TV because they know that their parents willnot buy for them.

The second part of the focus group sessions investigated the degree to which childrenemployed their advertising knowledge in responding to real advertisements. Although thefindings reported in the earlier sections of this paper showed that some seven year oldsand virtually all eight year olds were capable of understanding the advocatory nature ofadvertising, it is not clear whether they critically analysed advertisements using thisadvertising knowledge during normal viewing sessions. The brands represented inadvertisements used in the field research are not reported in this paper because ofcommercial sensitivity.

Responses to the group questions “what was the advertisement about?” and “what was itsaying?” were coded and classified. Six distinct categories of response type wereidentified. These responses provided an insight into the actual thoughts that children haveduring and after normal television viewing. Interestingly, some children’s responses wereentirely unrelated to the researcher’s questions – eg. ‘These sorts of ads are always on TV

This may have indicated a level of response to repeated advertisementsor participant fatigue. The results for each of the age groups are tabled below, showingresponses to the two different advertisements labelled A and B..

Table 7. Types of responses by five and six year olds to actual advertisements.CATEGORISEDRESPONSES

Whatwas itabout?

A B % %

What was itsaying?

A B % %

What does itwant

children todo?

A B % %

TOTALRESPONSES

A B % %

Factual product information 65 39 50 100 0 0 33 41Description ofad. execution

35 44 33 0 0 0 19 21

Commercial intent thoughts 0 0 17 0 26 33 14 10Ad or product attitudes & opinions 0 4 0 0 5 33 3 12Philanthropic perceptions 0 9 0 0 53 34 24 14Irrelevant comments 0 4 0 0 16 0 7 2TOTAL 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% (n=42) (n=48)

Almost ninety percent of the responses to the first question were factual and descriptiverecalls of the advertisement and the product. The results also show that some five and sixyear olds, when asked a third prompting question, did identify that an advertisementwants children to buy a product. This appears to contradict the findings in the earliersection of research where none of the children in this age bracket spontaneously (i.e.unprompted) mentioned commercial intent when asked what advertisements are, whatthey are they for and why they are shown.

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However, as suggested by Brucks et al. (1988), it seems likely that in normal,unprompted circumstances the cognitive responses of younger children do not usuallyinclude thoughts of commercial intent. In this age group children indicated thatcommercials exhort children to have fun, as if advertising is some philanthropic gesture.

Table 8. Types of responses by seven year olds to actual advertisements.

CATEGORISEDRESPONSES

Whatwas itabout?

A B % %

Whatwas it

saying? A B

% %

What does itwant children

to do? A B % %

TOTALRESPONSES

A B % %

Factual product information 50 75 33 34 0 0 25 40Description ofad execution

10 17 34 33 0 0 8 12

Commercial intent thoughts 30 0 33 33 73 50 50 24 Ad or product attitudes &opinions

10 8 0 0 0 20 4 12

Philanthropic perceptions 0 0 0 0 27 30 13 12TOTAL 100% 100% 100%100% 100% 100% 100% 100%

(n=24) (n=25)

The responses seven-year-old children gave were noticeably more complex andthoughtful than the younger group. Although they were also inclined to give descriptiveanswers to the first two questions, approximately one third of responses to the first twoquestions were about commercial intent. Several seven year olds had thoughts aboutcommercial intent as soon as they were asked the first question – “what was theadvertisement about?” Most seven year olds responded to the question “what does the adwant children to do” with comments about commercial intent. In the group situation itwas not possible to determine whether all the responses were genuine, personalresponses. It seemed likely that at least some of the children were prompted to speakfollowing the comments of others.

Table 9. Types of responses by eight year olds to actual advertisements.

CATEGORISED RESPONSES

Whatwas it about? A B % %

Whatwas it

saying? A B % %

What does itwant children

to do? A B % %

TOTALRESPONSES

A B % %

Factual product information 7 40 17 17 0 0 8 23Description ofad. Execution

7 0 0 0 0 0 4 0

Commercial intent thoughts 36 0 33 17 67 63 38 27Ad. / product attitudes & opinions 50 25 50 33 33 12 46 23Philanthropic perceptions 0 13 0 17 0 25 0 18Irrelevant product thoughts 0 12 0 16 0 0 4 9TOTAL 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% 100% (n=23) (n=21)

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The eight-year-old children gave very few literal, descriptive recall answers to this seriesof questions. Thoughts of commercial intent were immediately evident from the firstresponses. However, the most striking difference between eight year olds and the otherswas that the older children made evaluative responses. This is entirely consistent withPiaget’s theory where eight to eleven year olds use reasoning and logic (Wadsworth,1984:146). These children spontaneously offered opinions and attitudes towards theproduct and /or advertisement. Some examples of the first responses of eight year olds tothe question “what was this ad about” are as follows:

“They’re a waste of money”“It’s boring. It’s a stupid toy”

“The ad is trying to make you buy them”

Eight year olds applied their knowledge of commerce and advertising persuasion toadvertisements when they saw them. They were able to use logical reasoning anddeductive skills to ascribe motivations to others. They had also had exposure to, andexperience of, a growing number of products and thus were better equipped to evaluateadvertising claims.

Conclusions

By the age of seven many children perceive advertisements as intrusive. At eight years ofage most children are actively evaluating advertisements and products as they see them.Also there can be no doubt that by this age children perceive that advertising may attimes be irritating and boring. However, despite their increasing awareness of thecommercial intent of advertising, children are influenced by advertisements. Viewingcommercials leads to desire and purchase intent in many cases.

Children that have more advanced cognitive development, usually by the age of eight, areable to perceive commercial intent in advertising. The process of acquiring advertisingpersuasion knowledge is partly influenced by family attitudes and educationalprogrammes run at schools. The level of persuasion knowledge that a child has is alsoaffected by exposure to advertising. As cognitive development occurs children learn to bemore discerning viewers. They almost certainly develop their critical skills further as aresult of exposure to commercials. They learn to recognise certain advertising techniquesand as a consequence are generally more able to cope with television advertisingpersuasion attempts. However, this does not mean that children resist asking for, orbuying, advertised products.

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Limitations and directions for future research

This study is not without limitations. The children that took part in this research weredrawn from moderate and upper socio-economic groups and cannot be consideredrepresentative of the population as a whole. Secondly, children of articulate andopinionated parents that were highly motivated to participate in this study may have beenover-represented in this sample. It is intended to extend the study to include studentsfrom lower decile rating schools and from rural and provincial areas in the next phase ofthis research.

The prepared videotape of commercials contained advertisements that were familiar tomany participants. This was done to encourage as many responses as possible. In normalviewing situations reactions to advertisements are coloured by family and peer groupreactions. Critical responses are much more possible once a child has had a chance tocomprehend and evaluate a new product and/or new advertisement. Therefore, theresponses in this study may not have been novel reactions and could have been generatedas a result of prior exposure to the particular advertisements. If unfamiliar advertisementshad been used in this study then fewer critical responses may be expected. Furthermore,an investigation of responses to new advertising executions and novel products is beyondthe scope of this study.

Group prompting effects are inevitable in focus group studies. This is the main weaknessof this study. There are many methodological difficulties in studying the responses ofindividual children at a young age. Group work is much more easily accomplished andposes fewer ethical problems than one-on-one interviews. The results presented abovemay be biased towards the views of the most vocal and articulate members of the group.Some children clearly feed off the opinions of others and appear to build their responsesaccording to the views of certain opinion leaders. Other children may have had veryinteresting contributions to make but were too shy or otherwise unmotivated to sharetheir views with the group although every effort was made to minimise this. Whilst theresults are subject to bias, the trends that appeared between age groups are intuitivelycorrect and agree with the findings of overseas studies.

Future research will extend this study by using a larger, more representative sample toimprove the generalisability of the results.

The author acknowledges the support for this research project from the MasseyUniversity Research Foundation (MURF), the Association of New Zealand Advertisers(ANZA) and the Communication Agencies Association of New Zealand (CAANZ).

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