FTC Aims to Teach Children to Resist Advertsing Messages

As we all know, billions of dollars are spent every year on advertising by businesses, large or small. In many cases, it is beneficial to both consumers and competing businesses. Consumers get needed information to select which products to purchase and use. Businesses can draw benefits from advertising by measuring what customers want and innovating in order to stay one step ahead of their competitors.

As children are increasingly becoming a large part of the marketplace, they are also targeted by advertising and marketing campaigns. This makes them likely to see advertisements in many different places. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has started a creative campaign to educate kids between the ages of 8 to 12 about advertising and how to develop critical thinking skills when seeing ads in just about every part of their daily lives.
 

The government agency has started a website, admongo.gov, which strives to educate kids about the many forms that advertising can take. The site features a video game in which the player sees advertisements everywhere they go, such as on the street, on TV, in newspapers, magazines and even within video games. When faced with an ad, the player is then encouraged to ask questions, such as: Who put up this ad? What is the actual meaning of the ad? What actions does this ad want me to take? This teaches children some useful critical thinking skills by analyzing the advertising messages. Such skills can also be useful to help them understand other types of content, such as editorials in newspapers and magazines as well as works of literature.

One interesting aspect about the Admongo game is that it shows just how ever-present advertising material is in today's modern world. The FTC had previously designed a game, called You Are Here, which had the goal of teaching kids to determine where an ad came from and whether the marketing claims contained within were likely to be truthful. In Admongo, the main emphasis of the game's message is showing that ads can be found virtually anywhere, even in places where people wouldn't normally expect them, and can take on different forms, some of which could be very subtle indeed. In addition to traditional billboard and magazine ads, Admongo makes the player encounter text messaging ads, cross-promotions, ads located within video games as well as product placement.

Teaching young kids about product placement is important, as several popular TV shows use subtle product placement. American Idol, a top rated show amongst kids for many years has featured over 4151 product placements in the first 38 episodes of the show. As this method of marketing is not an in-your-face type of advertising, it is important for youngsters to be able to recognize when they are being marketed a product.

Unless we show our children how to identify marketing messages, teaching them to be careful, frugal spenders will be hard. While Admongo is not the answer, it is certainly a useful tool in helping parents cope with bombardments of advertising aimed at our kids. Once we teach them to understand how advertising works, we can teach them to look for answers inside themselves instead of in products that promise to solve problems or television commercials that encourage unhealthy spending behaviors.