Tuesday 26 May 2009

Articles

THE MEDIA BUSINESS: ADVERTISING -- ADDENDA; Report Criticizes Effects Of Ads on Children
By Stuart Elliot


In this article from the New York Times Stuart Elliot talks about how yet another group; the American Psychological Association, has joined the discussion on the effect of advertising on children, especially on children under the age of 7 or 8. They argue that children under the age of 7 or 8 aren't able to look at advertising critically, and that they see the things that appear in commercials as truthful. This has a negative effect on children and their views. On the other hand, Richard O'Brien; executive vice president at the Washington office of the American Association of Advertising Agencies stated that " the advertising industry tries to protect the special sensibility of children." There are already some restriction as to what is allowed to be aimed at children and what not, but since the media, and therefore advertising aimed at children is growing, they want more limits.

Renate L Welch, Aletha Huston-Stein, John C Wright & Robert Plehal: 'Subtle Sex-Role Cues in Children's Commercials'
By Merris Griffiths


In this article Merris Griffiths discusses a study done by Welch et al on gender advertising. They look at 60 children's advertisements (20 aimed at boys, 20 aimed at girls, and 20 aimed at both sexes) to see how they differ in the areas of action, pace, visual/camera techniques and auditory techniques, also taking a look at aggression. They found that both girls and boys had the same amount of activity rate, which came as a surprise. Also when they looked at the pay of boys and girls advertising they found that it was about the same, yet in girls advertising it was more subtle. This reflects what they found when looking at visual/camera techniques; they found that boys had more cutting rates which were often abrupt, while girls had more fades and dissolves. When looking at the audio they found that in both cases the narrator had the same gender as the gender being advertised. They also found that boys had more noise, loud music and sound effects, while girls had soft music in the background. This would support the gender stereotype that girls are supposed to be quiet and silent, while boys are supposed to be loud and active. Aggression was hardly found in girls advertising. Griffiths concluded that there are differences between male and female advertising, yet it is subtle and therefore very dangerous.

Thursday 14 May 2009

Precis; Cant buy my love

Precis
Can’t Buy My Love; how advertising changes the way we think and feel
By Jean Killbourne


Can’t buy my love is a book discusses the negative side effects of advertising, focusing on how we think and feel, and how it corrupts our relationships. As having started her research with focusing on the impact of advertising on women (the film killing us softly; how women are advertised), this book also focuses mostly on the way advertising effects girls and women. In the book Jean Killbourne identifies the different elements in advertising that advertisers use to buy and how these affect individuals and the society that we live in.

The media is something that everyone interacts with daily; may it be newspapers, television, radio ect. What most people don’t know is how the media is affected by advertisers. Advertisers are usually the main sponsors or owners of media companies; it makes them the most important part of the media; if an advertisers stops sponsoring a newspaper, it will start encountering troubles. Due to the fact that advertising and the media are so intertwined (it is sometimes hard to tell the difference), important information is not included in favour of the sponsor. It is also the strong link between the two that contributes to the fact that advertising is all around us, it is our environment. Not only does it appear in the media, it also appears on public transport, the sides of buildings and even on the sand of beaches. There is barely a line left between advertising and our culture. This is also why we are all affected by advertising, no matter what we think; “To not be influenced by advertising would be to live outside of culture. No human being lives outside of culture" (Sut Jhally). Advertising has become such an important part of today’s society, that it fulfils the same role as mythology in the ancient cultures; it creates dominant attitudes, values and ideology in today’s society, and governs most of our behaviour.

One of the main effects of advertising that is being stressed is how it corrupts our relationships. Advertising turns things into lovers and lovers into things. Advertising often promises better relationships through products, but more dangerously relationships with the products; lovers grow cold but possessions stay with us and never change. Advertisement often offers us an intimate, often sexual relationship with a product, a relationship in which other human contact isn’t needed. Advertisement for products often show sex scenes and make it seem as if our sex will be better if we have a certain product. Usually though, the sex scenes we see in advertising are so sexy, that we aren’t satisfied with our own sex life, this has a negative effect on our relationships. It is not just relationships with our lovers that are being corrupted; also relationships with our children are a main theme. Many advertisements so emotionally evoking pictures of parents with their children, but in the end the thing that counts is the product that is being advertised; the slogan always points this out. What we must never forget though, is that products are products, and no matter how much we love them, they won’t love us back. Not only the advertisements corrupts our relationships, it is also the products that they sell; addiction alcohol, food and cigarettes can cause severe mental problems that can lead to depression and isolation; they this way effect our relationships with everyone around us, the only relationship needed is that with the product.

Another effect of advertising is how it effects people mentally, especially girls. It is well known that young people, especially girls, have a lot of anxieties and insecurities; often a low self-esteem and the advertisers play with this. Often advertisement promotes the fact that these feelings are normal, and then sells a product or life style that could help with these feelings, it can transform you; these products and lifestyles usually are harmful and dangerous, and usually come in the form of alcohol and cigarettes. This advertises an addictive mind-set by creating the illusion that we can transform through the product, that we can become something better. This is accomplished by creating a dreamlike and surreal landscape in advertisements. Not only will this product bring us to a world of peace, an oasis, it will also increase our pleasure, sexual performance and social competence. It creates an illusion in which our life seems dull, and the only way to excitement is to use the product that is being advertised. Not only does it create an addictive-mind set, it also create an environment in which addictions and eating disorders are normalized; advertisers will do anything to keep their best consumers (the addicts) hooked on the product. Advertisement often takes a characteristic of an addict or person with an eating disorder, and normalizes this; this method is most often used with alcohol. These addictions that are being encouraged have devastating effects on individuals and our society. These attitudes towards addiction are often targeted at children and teenagers; "today's teenager is tomorrows customer" (Philip Morris).

Advertisement also shows people standards of who they should be and what they should look like and how they should act (advertisement the new mythology). Girls, for example, should be thin and beautiful, and speak through their bodies. They are often shown as weak, insecure and fragile, but they should be sexual. It also creates an environment in which women are looked down upon; it encourages violence against women and it portrays women as objects (often they become the product). This has a negative effect on women, but of course the solution is a product, one which will suppress our anger and depression, or which offers rebellion. No matter what, the product is always the solution. It is a never ending cycle, which is profitable for the advertiser and deadly for the consumer.

Her solutions to all these problems are numerous. To be able to combat these problems, we need to realize that they are all related. One of the important things she says is that it’s a problem of the society, not just of the individual; in order to resolve these problems we need to change the environment. This approach is also known as a systems approach, and is not very liked by industries and corporations since it works. Counter-advertising also helps a lot, this is advertising that gives us honest information and deglamorizes products such as alcohol and tobacco. We must also teach the youth, mainly in media-literacy; corporations depend on a media-illiterate population. Schools should also not have any advertising in them. We must also not always belief everything that we hear and see, since corporations influence almost all the information that we get. To solve these problems we need to work together, form networks, coalitions, conferences and public outcries.