Destructive Effects Of Pharmaceutical Advertising

Every time you flip a magazine, change channels, or go online, you are struck with images of models who are super skinny with flashy outfits and have excessive make-up on. Ads not only try to sell their products, but also promote how females should look like. These models are airbrushed and photo shopped which is false advertisement. The media progressively encourages a thinner body image as the ideal for women. We see advertisements every day. Some of these ads use manipulative strategies that influence our choices and spending habits. For example, “One in every three articles in leading teen girl magazines included a focus on appearance, and most advertisements used appeal to beauty to sell their products.”(Teen Health) To grab the viewers’ attention, especially females, they include

In our society today a business is not a business without an advertisement. These advertisements advertise what American’s want and desire in their lives. According to Jack Solomon in his essay, “Master’s of Desire: The Culture of American Advertising,” Jack Solomon claims: “Because ours is a highly diverse, pluralistic society, various advertisements may say different things depending on their intended audiences, but in every case they say something about America, about the status of our hopes, fears, desires, and beliefs”(Solomon). Advertisers continue to promote the American dream of what a women’s body should look like. They advertise their products in hopes for consumers to buy them, so they can look like the models pictures in the ads. Behind these ads, advertisers tend to picture flawless unrealistic woman with the help of Photoshop. In our society today to look like a model is an American dream and can be the reasons why we fantasizes and buy these products being advertised. “America’s consumer economy runs on desire, and advertising stokes the engines by transforming common objects;signs of all things that Americans covet most”(Solomon).

For women, advertising exemplifies the ideal female body. According to Kilbourne, young girls are taught from a very early age that they need to spend lots of time and money to achieve this “physical perfection.” But realistically this cannot be achieved. The ideal woman’s body is Caucasian, very skinny, big breasts, no flaws, and pretty much no pores. This cannot be achieved because it is physically impossible to look like this; the illusion comes from the secret world of Photoshop. No woman is beautiful enough so they leave it to technology to create perfection. The supermodel Cindy Crawford said, “I wish I looked like Cindy Crawford!” She knew the realities of Photoshop and body image, and more women and girls need to become aware of this as well.

There are proponents of DTC prescription drug ads. They argue that “the ads inform patients about diseases and possible treatments, encourage people to seek medical advice, help remove stigma associated with medical conditions, and provide needed sales revenue to fund costly research and development (R&D) of new drugs (Drug Ads ProCon.org).” On the flip side opponents argue “that DTC drug ads misinform patients, promote drugs before long-term safety-profiles can be known, medicalize and stigmatize normal conditions and bodily functions like wrinkles and low testosterone, waste valuable medical appointment time, and have led to our society’s overuse of prescription drugs (Drug Ads ProCon.org).”

Teenagers have a “... need for independence, rebellion, and personal control,” (Source F). Marketers can use this in many ways. They can use it to their economical advantage by manipulating teenagers into buying their goods. But, PSA’s can really show teenagers the facts and promote good morals. Recent studies look into how advertisements affect adolescents, “... these studies show that social marketing has successfully changed health behavior such as smoking, physical activity, and condom use, as well as behavioral mediators such as knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs related to these behaviors,” (Source F). While it's true that it's easy for teenagers to be manipulated by commercials, a lot of other commercials can be a strong influence in building better lives for them. If people could focus on the pros rather then the cons, then they could see the big picture of marketing to

Advertisements are everywhere. They are a major part of modern day society. Whether it be a television commercial, an internet banner, or a billboard, advertisements influence people of all ages, but they affect a certain age group much more than others. Children ranging from toddlers to teenagers are exposed to thousands upon thousands of advertisements each year. Some of these advertisements are damaging to children, while others are a positive influence. Advertisements can either be used as a tool or a weapon. Food advertisements and manipulation strategies are both positive and negative, and how companies use them decides whether or not marketing to children is ethical.

Children are targeted in these ads they try to draw their attention by making the ads fun, and by using cool phrases. Moss proposes and “He explained how he would deploy strategic storytelling in the ad campaign for his snack, using a key phrase that had been developed with much calculations:” Eat’ Em Like Junk Food’ (494).This proves that ads plays a role in promoting food that are unhealthy and is putting children 's health at risk for obesity. To sum it up, children are exposed to high amount of unhealthy food advertisements which affects young children health and food choices. Therefore, the government needs to intervene and stopping the advertisement of unhealthy eating and start advertising healthier foods.

In a 65-year span, an average American spends around nine years watching television including 975 days of watching just commercials that is two million ads altogether. Parent are wondering what most of those commercials are regarding too? They are mostly businesses that are targeting kids to eat fast food or influence their parents to buy a product like a toy. Parents think that they can just turn off the T.V.? Yes, folks are correct they can shut down the T.V., but there are way more advertisements than just commercials so many that it is hard for even ad savvy parents to keep it away from their children. Marketers will try anything to get the kid to buy their products, or they will put a logo on everything that they can. How do they target

There is one specific advertisement that is always being advertised and that is Abilify. It is pill that helps people with schizophrenia and also depression. The side effects that were advertised were, Headache, Weight gain, Constipation, Blurred Vision, Nausea vomiting, and having a hard time going to sleep. The serious side effects include, Seizures, and Confusion. I don't think that the American consumer is knowledgeable about this pill, because it involves so many side effects, and also involves the dangerous risk of having a seizure. I think that Abilify does indeed have a high impact on the health care system. I think that all of these commercials that are being advertised have a huge impact on the cost of health care because, when more

you buy them this toy. Every one of our emotions is played on so that

Think about how often you are watching your favorite show on television and all of a sudden you are interrupted by a commercial. The commercial begins with the following words, “Do you suffer with …” and this question follows with the following sentence, “if so, then talk to your doctor about … (the name of the medication that is being advertised)”. These prescription drug advertisements are being shown all over the United States multiple times a day. It is these advertisements that are used for publicity and marketing that are affecting Americans. The majority of Americans engage in watching television. The prescription drug advertisements do have a positive impact on Americans but, these advertisements do more harm than good.

There are several reasons why advertising aimed at young children should be banned. Advertisers and marketers influence young children. Children are the future leaders of our world. Television encourages them to become consumers and equate ownership of things with self-worth. Thus, at an early age, children are influenced to associate status and self-worth with materialistic things. We are producing young consumers rather that productive citizens who will add value to society. While the government states its purpose for protecting children, in general terms, children are simply influenced and cannot tell advertising agenda from the truth.

Pharmaceutical companies should attempt to be as transparent as possible when marketing prescription drugs to the public. Their marketing efforts should not only convey the benefits of the prescription drug, but also easily convey the possible risks associated with the prescription drugs. Many patients may tend to think the benefits outweigh the potential risks of prescription drugs and may pressure their physician to prescribe it. Due to the way the prescription drug is marketed, the consumer may believe the

Food advertisements, if focused at the right people and in the right places, are a complete success. These features, some of which are commercials, seduce society into buying food that we necessarily do not need. Many advertisement companies, especially those about food, are directed to children because they know that if you grab the kids you have their parents. While brands are using fun cartoons like “Trix Rabbit” and “Toucan Sam” (Green, 2007, p. 49) supermarkets are taking these items and placing them right in front of the children, at their level, advertising the “Fun foods” (Elliot, 2008, p. 259-273). They do this so the kids will use their, “pester power” (Scholsser, n.d., p. 2) to get what they want. A series of studies have been performed on children and television advertisements. An article states, “These studies have generally linked children's television viewing to negative health effects” (Korr, 2008, p. 451). Amongst these negative effects is a higher level of childhood obesity (p. 451). Similarly, in another study performed by a group of researchers, kids were asked to explain the television commercials that they remembered the best. The answers given were then compared with their diets. Interestingly, the items those children remembered best, chips, sweets, and sodas were a huge part of what they ate (Hitching & Moynihan, 1998, p. 511-517). However, some authors argue that television producer’s, even though their

Advertising today focuses on specific targeted demographic groups. There is a direct focus on marketing products to young consumers. This age group sees the commercials, but does not really understand the directed message. This can have an adverse effect on the way children interpret and understand the message being presented to them. 'The average American child sees more than 40,000 commercials a year, and advertisers spend more than $12 billion annually marketing to them?double the amount of 10 years ago.' (APA-1) Children watching television are exposed to every channel running commercials that are sending out a mature message to an immature audience. There needs to be something done to