Should Banned Be Banned For Minors? Essay

Fast food advertisements can be found around the world, on newspapers, television, and even online. Children, teenagers, and parents have seen marketing focused on fast food. While adults may think little about such blatant advertising tactics that are solely designed to attract new customers, how are kids affected? People across the United States worry about the ever increasing obesity rates amongst children in recent years. A common explanation is the spike in popularity of fast food. Most kids and teenagers have eaten fast food at least once in their lifetime. But why has fast food gotten increasingly popular recently? Fast food has always been known to be very unhealthy, but kids still consume it anyway. The culprit: fast food advertising. In modern times, the majority of kids living in the United States have access to the internet or television, where they are easy targets for advertising. To prevent the nation from growing up obese, fast food companies should end all ad campaigns targeted towards children and focus advertising strictly on adults. These advertisements cause kids to consume fast food more often, to eat an unhealthy diet, and to grow up in a culture dependent on fast food.

“Congress should ban advertising that preys upon children, it should stop subsidizing dead-end jobs, it should pass tougher food safety laws, it should protect American workers from serious harm, it should fight against dangerous concentrations of economic power (Schlosser). People must wonder how is it that a fast food company has so much customers. Advertising is the answer. The power advertisers have to be able to influence so many people 's decisions and affect people’s lives especially the lives of young children is incredible. Advertisers know just who to target and they research how too. In Eric Schlosser’s book Fast Food Nation, Schlosser explains to the readers how advertisers use techniques to draw in customers. A technique used is the “cradle-to-grave” which focuses on children to make them lifelong consumers. Like many researcher, Schlosser, has found that advertising to children when they are younger makes them be loyal to the company, and a child 's “brand loyalty” may begin as early as the age of two (43). Fast food advertising reaches out and harms families everywhere. This is why it is crucial that the people to make changes in their lives and change the way fast food is affected us.

The author is set out to target companies such as the fast food industry and its affiliation with child targeted advertisement. The article begins by

Children spend nearly $30 billion of their own money on junk food. Marion Nestle stated on https://www.nejm.org that, “The food companies make misleading claims and they spend massive amounts sponsoring scientist and major health organizations to influence their research and guidelines.” Yet, marketing’s recent tactics have gone way further to persuade children. Along with television advertisements, they have shifted to product placements in toys, games, educational materials, songs, movies, and much more. The IOM noted that “…by two years of age most children can recognize products in supermarkets and ask for them by name.” More children are becoming obese and diabetic before they’re old enough to make decisions about these

Commercials through television and radio aimed towards children are ethical because it helps build healthy ideals. Through commercials, children can see that doing certain things are good for you! They can see that it is what they should do. “Advertising and marketing techniques could encourage children to eat

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.

Although adults can view food advertisements critically to diminish their intended effects on their diet, Mello, Studdert, and Brennan found that children do not have this same cognitive ability (2605). They found that children under eight years of age are “generally unable to understand the persuasive intent of advertising” (2601). This means that children aged seven and under may not be able to distinguish the difference between when they are being marketed to and when they are being educated, for instance. This is likely the reason why “children who watch more television than do other children are more likely to identify incorrectly which of two foods is more healthful” (Mello, Studdert, and Brennan 2605). Studies have found that around 50% of “all nutrition-related information in television advertisements is misleading or inaccurate” (Mello, Studdert, and Brennan 2605). The food industry’s advertising practices are deceitful and harmful, yet they are not currently subject to legal

Children under the age of six “cannot distinguish between advertisements and regular programming” and those under eight “do not comprehend the persuasive nature of advertisements” (American Psychological Association). Children have a remarkable ability to remember content from ads that they have been exposed to (American Psychological Association). “Research has found strong associations between increases in advertising in non-nutritious food and rates of childhood obesity” (American Psychological Association). During on study researchers looked at the effect of branding, the research used children 3 to 5 years old, two portions of identical foods were given, one in McDonald’s wrapping and the other not in the wrapping, the children would say that the food in the McDonald’s wrapper tasted better (Klass). This study shows how children are being influenced by what advertisements they view. In young children, research has shown “that for every one-hour increase in [television] viewing per day, there are high intakes of … fast food …” (American Psychological Association). And with children who “watch more than 3 hours of television a day are 50 percent more likely to become obese…” (American Psychological

Children are very important to marketers. They influence their parents and friends’ decisions. Every day children 2 to 17 years of age watch between 12-21 food commercials and that’s just on television (Haupt). They are also being bombarded by ads on the internet, video games, and smart phones. They’ve also introduced fast food into the schools. Many elementary and middle schools have Pizza Huts, Taco Bells, and various other restaurants in the schools. The fruits and

Fast food advertisement agencies take advantage of the ignorance of children to scam them into wanting unhealthy meals. Each year, the fast food industry spends over $3 million of advertising targeted towards children. Half of television advertisement is used during children’s shows and with cartoons. Out of all the factors

There is presently much controversy regarding the idea of unhealthy foods and how companies shamelessly market these products to children. Individuals in the food and beverage industry constantly promote the belief that they are actively involved in providing society with important information concerning what is healthy and what is not. Moreover, most promote their products as having no negative effects on individuals who consume them, as doing otherwise would surely reflect badly on their businesses. It is generally known that children are vulnerable because they have very little experience in filtering information and food companies take advantage of this by introducing diverse methods to promote their products even with the fact that it is likely for children to get sick as a consequence.

In today’s society, the food and beverage industry is faced with an ongoing ethical dilemma because they are far more concerned with making money than providing a good, safe, and healthy product for consumers. The biggest victims in this unethical marketing scheme are children. Children are the least informed and most influenced of all potential consumers (5). Although children usually don’t directly purchase these products themselves, their desires strongly influence their parent’s decision on what to buy and what the child will eat. Most products geared towards children are unhealthy, processed foods that are high in sugars and low in nutritional content (6). This has led to a rise in childhood

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

Thousands of advertisements on junk food, fast food, soft-drink, etc are shown on TV and heard over radio have indirectly lead to the grown of obesity and anorexia in teenagers. This is one of the critical global problem of today which is threatening our next generations for being unhealthy and being exposed to many serious diseases and sicknesses such as diabetes, high blood pressure, heart problem and anorexia.