For today's children, the world is a parade of brand names. They wake up in the morning to breakfasts of Kellogg's Star Wars cereal, and go to sleep at night in Hello Kitty or Spiderman pajamas. In between, snack-food companies vie for vending positions in the hallways of their schools; pop stars and celebrities beckon them in designer-label clothes; and popular TV shows, movies, books, and music pelt them with subliminal product placements -- from soft drinks to computers. McDonald's has even hired an entertainment marketing firm to help it buy mentions of Big Mac sandwiches in hip-hop songs.
Advertising and marketing campaigns aimed at children are nothing new, of course. Baseball cards go back more than a century, and TV ads during Saturday morning cartoons have been a staple for decades. America is, after all, a capitalist society; marketing is a central part of our economic system.
But the scale and sophistication of today's campaigns far exceeds anything that has come before. The consumer culture has turned pervasive and invasive, and it is targeting kids in increasingly surprising and troubling ways to entice them to spend their pocket money -- more than $200 billion per year -- and then become lifelong customers. Indeed, analysts say children are the new darlings of Madison Avenue. Marketers hire psychologists and child development experts to help them devise strategies that take advantage of children's deeply impressionable nature. The modern marketing repertoire now includes word-of-mouth campaigns in which companies identify the "alpha kids" on playgrounds and in malls and hire them to generate enthusiasm about new products among their friends -- without ever
telling those friends they've been recruited to do so.
Another technique takes advantage of young people's enthusiasm for video and computer games: Marketers develop hybrid "advergames" that are specifically designed to promote certain products and brands. While children play these games, brand logos and product images flash at them repeatedly. After a few rounds of an online advergame associated with candy or junk food, for example, a child is likely to remember a brand well enough to ask for it at the grocery store.
At the same time, marketers survey kids' interests by prompting them to participate in online contests, chat rooms, and the like, culling their personal information and preferences in order to design more tailored, personalized marketing strategies.
And then there is the next frontier: cell phones. Nearly one-half of all 10 to 18 year-olds have them, and they are evolving into mini-personal entertainment centers for playing games, listening to music, and watching videos. Cell phones have the dual virtue for marketers of offering (a) direct communication with children, either by voice or touch-key interactive programs, and (b) a clear path around the protective eyes of gatekeeper parents. Maybelline and Timex have both announced plans for cell phone-based marketing campaigns aimed at teenagers.
Some of the techniques for marketing to children may not seem particularly odious. But the cumulative effect is to commercialize childhood to an unprecedented degree -- with unhealthy consequences.
In fact, a growing body of research indicates that the consumer culture's harmful effects on children can run the gamut from physical and emotional problems to increased parent-child conflicts over spending decisions, distorted value systems, and strained family budgets. One study found a strong correlation between children's immersion in the consumer culture and their feelings of depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem. Meanwhile, ads for alcohol and tobacco have, not surprisingly, been
linked to underage alcohol and tobacco use. Studies have also found correlations between child obesity rates and the prevalence of TV ads for junk food; research has specifically shown that
children's exposure to food advertising and marketing may be influencing their food choices.
Equally troubling is children's frequent exposure to ads for violent entertainment -- adult-rated movies, TV shows, video games, and music -- because watching violent media has been linked to childhood displays of violent and aggressive behavior. Sexual imagery in marketing campaigns and consumer products geared for kids (like padded push-up bras and high-heeled shoes for young girls) is also hyper-charging children's sexuality before they may be cognitively or emotionally ready.
Parents may not be aware of every last marketing practice, but they see enough to know basically what is happening, and they don't like it. As Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) said in a speech last March, "Parents worry that their children will not grow up with the same values that they did or that they believe in because of the overwhelming presence of the media telling them to buy this and that, or conveying negative messages filled with explicit sex content and violence."
There is no doubt that the primary responsibility for shielding America's children from the damaging effects of a rampant commercial culture lies with parents. But they can't -- and shouldn't -- do it alone. Helping parents do their job better represents both a policy challenge and a political opportunity. Democrats, in particular, would do well to become champions for children's and parents' interests,
because, as Progressive Policy Institute senior fellow Barbara Dafoe Whitehead explained in the April 2005 issue of BLUEPRINT, parents doubt Democrats' commitment on these cultural issues. That's one big reason they have been voting Republican in recent presidential elections. (See a longer report, "Closing the Parent Gap," at ppionline.org.)
So what is there to do? Here are some ideas:
Ensure that marketing practices aimed at children are fair. Experts argue that a well-established principle in communications law holds that for an ad to be considered fair, an audience must be able to recognize that it is an ad and must be able to identify the seller. But
psychological research concludes that children -- particularly children younger than 8 -- may be able to associate Ronald McDonald with McDonald's restaurants, but they lack the cognitive maturity to understand the persuasive intent of marketing, or to view ads with skepticism. They are likely to see
advertising as truthful and entertaining, not as a come-on. Because children are developmentally
vulnerable to advertising, child health experts, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, argue
that ads aimed at them are inherently unfair, particularly for children under 8.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has traditionally had the regulatory authority to uphold U.S. laws that prohibit "unfair or deceptive" commercial practices. But Congress in 1980 explicitly stripped the commission of the power to regulate unfair advertising to children. That was after it proposed banning TV ads for children on the grounds that children were not discerning enough to keep the
ads in perspective. The commission was particularly concerned that most ads aimed at children were for sugary foods, and children did not understand the health risks of excessive sugar consumption. Congress balked after industry and marketers reacted strongly. It passed a blanket restriction, prohibiting the FTC from issuing any sort of rule in the area of children's advertising on the grounds of unfairness.
But since then, a growing body of scientific evidence has more conclusively shown how children in certain stages of cognitive development react to advertising, and what its harmful effects may be. Equally important, marketers have found more surreptitious means than traditional print ads for
reaching children. They are capitalizing in particular on children's comfort with technology and their immersion in the new interactive environment of the Web. More research is needed on the effects of all this marketing and consumerism, but enough is known to conclude that Congress should lift its restriction on the FTC's authority, and direct it to investigate all forms of marketing aimed at children. Once started, the FTC should issue a report on its findings within a year, and then issue rules to guide marketing practices directed at children.
Ensure that advertising is appropriate for the media in which it appears. General-audience entertainment should include only general-audience advertising. Ads for beer and R-rated movies, for example, shouldn't be aired during primetime sitcoms, when children are watching. To stop that practice, Congress should direct the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to monitor the advertising that appears in media that are popular among young people. The HHS should then begin systematically naming and shaming companies that advertise adult-rated entertainment or adult products like alcohol or tobacco on TV shows, in magazines, and in other popular media that have large youth audiences. And if a pattern emerges in which some companies continue to advertise adult-restricted products to large youth audiences,
Congress should give the FTC the authority to impose fines on repeat offenders.
Require toys and other products based on movies and TV shows to carry consistent age ratings. Consider the slew of Star Wars: Episode III toys now being marketed to children ages 4 and up, despite the fact that the movie is rated PG-13, and its director has discouraged parents from taking young children to see it because of its violent content.
Or, consider the line of toys based the on R-rated Arnold Schwarzenegger movie Terminator 3 -- Rise of the Machines. One toy, recommended for kids 12 and up, is an action figure that depicts Schwarzenegger's character with a bloody face. Other toys based on the movie are designed for children as young as 5. Why not ensure that the age recommendations displayed on packaging match the age ratings of the original movies, and let parents decide if the toys are appropriate for their children?
Protect children's privacy. Providing consumers information to help them make purchasing decisions is always a sound policy principle. But when information flows in the other direction -- from consumers to marketers -- there should be appropriate safeguards to ensure the consumers' privacy. That is particularly true when the information in question is about children: their names and addresses, personal preferences, and more. In the burgeoning interactive marketplace of websites, cell phones, digital TV, and other communication devices, marketers have many opportunities to collect personal data from children.
Congress established protections for children under 13 in the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998. That law dictates the circumstances under which companies may collect information from children. Congress should now extend the same protections to everyone under 16. It should also ban corporations from selling or purchasing the personal information of children under 16 for commercial
marketing purposes, unless parents give express consent.
Curtail marketing activities inside public schools. The consumerism that children encounter daily is by no means confined to TV, the Internet, and pocket-sized gadgetry. The parade also marches straight through schools. Cash-strapped school districts open their doors to marketers to generate much-needed revenues -- sometimes millions of dollars. Beverage contracts alone may generate up to $1.5 million per year for a large school district. The National Soft Drink
Association estimates that 62 percent of U.S. principals have signed "pouring rights" contracts, giving soda companies exclusive access to their schools. Advertising also shows up on billboards, yearbooks, newsletters, textbook covers, screen savers, team uniforms, vending machines, and school buses.
(San Francisco students have in past years ridden to and from school in buses sponsored by Old Navy, for example.)
Companies even create educational materials. Oil companies, for example, sponsor lessons about energy. Consumer products companies donate packets of deodorant sticks and feminine hygiene products to kids in 5th grade sex education classes, a time when many are struggling with adolescent insecurities. Some packets include testimonials like this one from an adolescent boy: "I used to be
really worried about sweating a lot, but since I started using an antiperspirant every morning, I'm dry all day."
A Government Accountability Office report found that few states have laws or comprehensive regulations governing in-school marketing. Schools and school districts have widely varying policies. So Congress should direct the secretary of education to investigate all forms of marketing in schools and then develop a set of voluntary recommendations for states to use in establishing comprehensive policies on marketing. Why not set a goal of completely eliminating marketing in elementary schools, where many children don't yet understand what advertising is?
End the practice of using children's friendships for marketing purposes. Of course, it is doubly hard for children to understand that they are being marketed to when the pitch is coming from their peers who have been recruited to spread enthusiasm for products by word-of-mouth on playgrounds and in malls, either for pay or for freebies. That technique is a new variation on the concept that experts call "viral" marketing, which spreads information from person to person, like a virus. (A more innocuous type of viral marketing is common on websites: links that say, "email this article to a friend.") But taking commercial advantage of children's friendships crosses a line into ethically murky territory.
Congress should require companies to disclose what they are doing when they use adolescents in these viral marketing campaigns. And the FTC should require marketers to ensure that the "alpha kids" they enlist to promote products tell their peers up front that they are working for a sponsor.
Protect children involved in product research. Many of the products marketed to children today are based on focus groups, demonstrations, and other trials with children. We should demand that the marketing industry protect children by following the same standards that federally funded researchers must follow. Those standards include oversight by diverse and credible professional review boards, which approve and monitor research projects, and protect the rights and welfare of child participants.
Ask more from broadcasters. We are way beyond old-fashioned TV ads now. But TV is still a very important conduit for the consumer culture. Congress should strike a new
bargain with broadcasters: In exchange for free use of the public spectrum, they should provide more -- and better -- children's programming. Broadcasters are now required to air three hours of children's programming per week. That should double to six hours. Broadcasters should also make it commercial-free programming, target it to 6 to 12 year olds, and schedule it to air after school, when children are most likely to be watching.
Ask more from cable and satellite TV providers, too. Striking a new bargain with broadcasters is a good start, but 85 percent of American households subscribe to cable or satellite TV. Regardless of how they get it, polls show that parents are deeply concerned about sex and violence on TV. Furthermore, most are unaware of, or confused by, parental control technologies like the V-chip. Therefore, Congress should give cable and satellite TV companies a choice: Start offering parents the option of subscribing to family-friendly channel packages, or face the same indecency regulations that apply to over-the-air broadcasters, as some powerful lawmakers are proposing. Family-friendly channel packages could include channels like Nickelodeon, The Learning Channel,
Animal Planet, and news channels, but not MTV and other channels that tend to be inappropriate for younger children.
There is no way to totally eliminate marketing from the culture -- nor should that be the goal. A highly developed market economy needs advertising. But policymakers can help parents shield their children from some of the culture's corrosive influences by demanding more responsible and age-appropriate marketing that does not exploit children's psychological and cognitive weak spots or push them too
quickly into adulthood.
