China bans sexually suggestive advertisements on TV

Check this out:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20983975/

12 kinds of ads

I wanted to show it in class today, but since some videos load slowly, it would just take too long.
But please check it out before the next class. This slide show examines number of ads and puts them in variety of categories, depending on what enticing technique do they use.

http://www.slate.com/id/2170872/slideshow/2170932/fs/0//entry/2170933/

Advertising to children- effects

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/118/6/2563

Its a pretty good article- read if you have time

is advertising ethical and does it influence children?..... read on..

http://www.apa.org/monitor/sep00/advertising.html

Post from Jenna

Advertisements are used to influence, persuade, and inform consumers, but their ultimate goal is to get consumers to buy a product. Advertisers want to advertise where they know they can reach people, but it’s the people they are reaching, that many question if advertising is ethical. Ads contain jingles, memorable music, celebrities, etc. and most ads don’t contain very much information. According to Nina Riccio, “Media messages are created by people whose job it is to come up with interesting images, songs, or graphics that will make you want to buy their product,” (p. 93). People remember ads for a few reasons: 1. because it was funny, 2. it had a memorable jingle, 3. it fulfilled the consumer’s need or want, and/or 4. all of the above. According to Mindy F. Ji and James U. McNeal, “The development of advertising in the United States can be divided into four stages: product information, product image, personalization, and lifestyle…” (p.5).

I think advertising is ethical, to an extent. If advertising didn’t exist, how would people know which product to buy and not buy? According to John E. Calfee, “…The information that advertising imparts helps consumers make better decisions,” (p.105). All advertising isn’t bad; it can provide useful information, like in the Truth ads, or in public service ads, like the Smokey the Bear ads or the One campaign ads (that want to fight AIDS). If advertisers didn’t advertise to certain groups of people, they wouldn’t be doing their jobs and making money. Advertisers advertise to certain age groups, nationalities, genders, etc. Most ads that are on television channels for children (such as Nickelodeon) are either for food or toys. I think advertisers advertise towards children because they know if they can persuade a kid or teen to buy their product, and get them hooked on the product, they will have a customer for life; this is called brand loyalty. If brand loyalty is established, then the consumer will only choose that particular product and no other.

Alcohol advertising can affect/ have an impact on young people and influence certain behaviors. If an ad contains a group of people having a good time and they happen to be drinking alcohol, the person watching the commercial may think that is a social norm and a common occurrence, and that it’s cool to drink. According to Riccio, “Whether liquor manufacturers are intentionally pitching their ads to teens is not important. The fact is, teenagers are watching and absorbing the message that drinking is a fun, cool, and popular thing to do,” (p.92). This quote reiterates the same for cigarette/tobacco ads. Cigarette ads used to dominate and were very popular for advertisers and with consumers, but then when the effects of smoking cigarettes came out, these ads were banned from television. According to Dave Dhaval and Henry Saffer, “…Alcohol is among the most heavily advertised consumer goods…” (p.3). If they ban cigarette ads on television, why not alcohol ads? Drinking excessive amounts of alcohol can harm a person, just like smoking too many cigarettes is can. According to Riccio, “Alcohol is the drug most used and abused by adolescents- more than marijuana, heroin, cocaine, and pills combined…Alcohol is usually a factor in the three leading causes of death among youth: accidents, suicide, and homicide…Drinking encourages reckless behavior,” (p.92).

Some countries even have restrictions on times alcohol ads can be aired, why doesn’t the United States? They air alcohol ads throughout the day. Granted these ads aren’t on television channels for children, but they are on other channels children and young people watch, like ABC or FOX, where they play game shows for kids and families. Look at the Super Bowl for instance, people from various ages watch the Super Bowl, and most watch it for the ads. Most of the ads that are aired are for alcohol. A young person may not think of an alcohol ad as an alcohol ad, because the ad my contain animals or be funny, and the alcohol part may go straight over their heads, because it doesn’t interest them. However, not everyone is the same; another young person may see the same ad and think differently.

Kmarx?

It is quite humorous how Russ Baker mentions company such as Kmart in regards to sensitivity and advertisement (Baker, p119). According to a study done a few years ago, Kmart had some explaining to do when faced with sweatshop accusations.

“Factories included Al Shahaed Apparel & Textile and Honorway Jordan Ltd., both of which sow for K-Mart’s discount brand names. The lack of respect for workers’ basic human rights includes:

• Human trafficking and involuntary servitude of guest workers
• Confiscation of workers’ passports and denial of legally required identification cards
• Routine work shifts of 15 to 16 hours. More commonly, workers were forced to work through 38, 48, and even 72 hour shifts at Al Shahaed Apparel & Textile
• No sick days, paid vacations, or government holidays allowed
• Wages below the legal minimum
• Sporadic pay
• Inadequate and unsanitary working conditions
• Reports of sexual abuse and rape
• Workers subject to pay reductions, humilitation, violence, and threats if production goals not met” (http://www.coopamerica.org/programs/rs/profile.cfm?id=251)

Can you say; Hypocrite?

Lets go commercial

As I was reading both articles (Yes by John Calfee and NO by Russ Baker) I realized that the two articles were comparing apples and oranges. Calfee and Baker gave insightful points on advertising; however, they were not opposing each other’s point of view. While Calfee informed us on the significance of advertisements, Baker focused more on the influence the ad. companies have in today’s society. While stating that, I did come away with an agreement with John Calfee.

John Calfee brought up a great point toward the beginning of the article (Calfee, p109). His example of fiber, and its connection to cancer summarized the importance of advertisements. With that one ad uproar, (fiber, cereal, cancer) a chain of events led to corporate and public discussion; exchange of information, and more importantly, competition.

Through advertising we, as a society, can better judge products that are on display and understand our options. In a capitalistic world we accept or reject whatever is displayed. While they might be annoying sometimes, ads are necessary in order to, at the very least, inform us of our available choices.

The Dangers in Marketing to Youth

http://www.co.el-dorado.ca.us/publichealth/HealthColumns/2007/Marketing%20Alcohol_to_Kids_April_25_2007.html

Young children are not yet mature enough to make decisions and choices when it comes to what they see being advertised. Countries such as Sweden and Norway ban all advertising to children under 12 and in Greece, toy commercials can onbly run at certain hours. (Taking Sides, 92) These ads banned are for toys, things that are made for children, if the impact of advertising is so great for adolescents, then something should be done to protect kids from the advertisements for alcohol and tobacco, which are made for adults. The problem with advertising is that the whole story isnt told about the product, assumptions and impliations are made that by using the product, which are not always true. (93) There are so many underlying things surrounding advertising, that some advertisers even take things to a level in which they beleive that what is surrounding the ad is just as important and has the same effect as what is in the ad. Companies such as Colgate-Palmolive won't allow ads in media where the content is "anti-social or in bad taste." They prescreen any questionable content before finalizing the placement of their ads. (119) This raises the questions about how ethical advertising really is, and the exact effects it has on consumers.

The super bowl, one of the biggest advertising events of the year; it has been said that more people watch for the commercials than for the game itself. One of the most popular and highly anticipated campaigns each year would be the Budweiser ads. These ads feature cartoon characters which offer more humor and entertainment than it does information about the product. According to Marketing Alcohol to Kids, "It’s no wonder that after every recent Super Bowl game polls show viewers under 17 years of age prefer commercials for beer over any other product." I thought this was an interesting read. "For every million additional readers aged 12 to 19 years, beer advertising increases by 60 percent, while ads for distilled spirits increase by 30 percent." Alcohol is on the rise, according to How Alcohol Ads Target Teens, (93), "Alcohol is the drug most used and abused by adolescents." It is causing more problems due to the consequences both immediate, which include a decrease of grades in schools, drinking and driving, suicide, sexual behavior influenced by alcohol, and violence, as well as long term effects such as alcoholism and the likelihood of drinking as adults.

Today's youth is being hit left and right with more ads than they know what to do with. "Adolescence is a time of life marked by increased risk-taking, sensation-seeking and erratic behavior in the best circumstances. For some young people, alcohol can have a special allure, but as the Surgeon General report indicates, “This attraction occurs at the very time adolescents may not be fully prepared to anticipate all the effects of drinking alcohol.” When alcohol is being portrayed in such a positive light, as something fun and interesting, its no wonder children are getting involoved at such an early age. It sparks the curiosity in them to figure out exactly what it is they are missing.

This leaves the questions up for discussion:

Who should have control over what our adolescents are being exposed to, if anyone, whose responsibility is it? The government, society, families, companies?

What restrictions should be put on advertising? Times, placement, content?

Not everyone makes good choices -

Check this out:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/09/17/internet.death.ap/index.html

It is of course a singualr case and should not be used as an argument - but I find interesting how far will people go.

looking at the big picture

In reading over these posts, everyone seems to have a lot of interesting perspectives and opinions on the subject of Media & Violence. It’s nice to see that we all can bring something to the table. And yet, while I’m aware that there are more and different aspects of this topic to be discussed than already mentioned, I feel the need to elaborate on a fellow students comment. I’m not ignoring the effects of media violence on our children, as I’m sure our class discussion will completely revolve around it, and because so, I’ve chosen to use my blog space as a means to point out a secondary issue that this topic brought up in my research and web searching. Jen posted her concerns that we are all so focused on the violence in the media and the effects it has on our societies youth, that we neglect the other issues that we should have with our children’s overall mass consumption of media, not only the violence within it. We begin to blame video games for violence instead of the actual crimes occurring on the streets around us. We think that it is the media that is projecting violence into our homes that is unavoidable. And, the fact of the matter is that, it is nearly impossible, despite all the parental controls on cable systems, browsers, etc, to have absolute control over the violence in all of your children’s programming from television or internet content. The control falls to the attention of the parent who needs to take a more active role in the entertainment and free time of their child’s life. Let’s say that we were able to have complete control and eliminate violence from at least two forms of media in your children’s daily routines (using Television and video games as examples). After we were through and had complete control over the violence factor, we would then have to move on and begin to focus on the fact that our children are still sitting in front of those media outlets and becoming unsocial, non-communicative and unhealthy.
See
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/09-04-2007/0004655823&EDATE=

the fact that gaming corporations have actually taken strides to effectively resolve the issue linked between obesity and over use of video games clearly shows that there are more issues when examining media’s effect on children than just the presence of violence alone.

Not yet Rated

Recently I saw the Documentary This film is not yet rated. It is an excellent film, and I highly recommend it. There is one clip that caught my attention. The director and actress form the film The Cooler were interviewed on the subject of censorship. The director stated that his film originally received a NC-17 rating (No child under the age of 17 admitted, period), due to one sex scene. An NC-17 practically means that the film is doomed financially. The advertisers pull their money, the movie theaters refuse to play it. The movie has no chance of making a profit.

The controversial scene consisted of oral sex between a male and female. For one second, there is a shot of the female’s pubic hair. The review board felt that it was too much for an R rating. They gave the director and ultimatum: loose the pubes and you get your R rating.

The director was furious with the decision. His artistic work would be compromised for one second of pubic hair. Ultimately, he caved in, due to the pressure from his production company, and took out the scene in theaters. But you can find the scene on the DVD.

However, there is a twist to the whole story. Around the same time The Cooler was in theaters, Sin City, an over the top violent thrill ride, was in theaters with an R rating. The director explained that his kids most likely would be harmed more while watching Sin City than being exposed to a pubic hair for one second. Obviously he did not condone for Kids to watch an R rated film, but he merely pointed out that there is a double standard when it comes to violence and sex.

what is with the age range?

I think that one of this is one of the hardest things to research I mean there is nothing concrete about the evidence because there is so much of the human element involved. Nothing is guaranteed especially dealing with violence and I think much of this has to do with who a person already is, if there life is bad and violence is something they know, then I feel like violence is the answer for them. For me I don't think that video games or violence on TV make people more likely to commit violent acts. I do wonder if rather than focusing on TV violence creating violent people I think there might be a more interesting study to focus on TV, the internet, and video games helping to create a person's isolation from society and that leading to violence or depression. I don't know just a thought.

I feel like these studies might be too controlled because of the laboratory setting as Jib Fowles said. I mean it does make sense that in a new environment kids act differently than they do at home. I also had a concern with these experiments, for me the age range seems enormous. One in particular ranged from 8 to 15 and another 11 to 16. I just feel as though this is an enormous range. Children are constantly changing and growing and I think that to lump all of these ages together is a huge mistake on any researchers part. I mean we all know that there is a really big difference in the way an 8 year old acts and a 15 year old acts. There lives are completely different and that is why I really have trouble trusting these experiments. I feel like and acceptable age range might be 2 years at the most for children.

What are the effects of media violence on public opinion? The most exposured are the children.

Mass-media has been acused along the time that drives people towards a large set of activities and behaviours which otherwise wouldn’t have been considered and towards acepting beliefs, values and idea which otherwise wouldn’t have suported.

Since the wide spread of the televised image, its impact on the audience has been thoroughly studied especially on children and youth. Reserchers have emphasized the negative aspects, underlining the fact that mass-media causes antisocial and psichological activities defined and clasified as „problems” or „threats” of „antisocial”, „damaging” or „dangerous” nature.

Certain groups of population have been identified as being especially vulnerable to such efects, for example children, young people and persons with low education.
The website
http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/issues/violence/effects_media_violence.cfm presents a few results of research studies regarding the effects of media violence, especially on children.

The most important conclusion of these studies is that the exposure of children to programs that promote violence determines long term aggressive behaviors in their evolution as social entities.
Starting from the article "Research on the Effects of Media Violence" published on the website, I tried to find out explanations regarding the media aggressivity on children using the field of psycho-sociology.

During the childhood, every individual is easy to influence, the process of learning being made by imitating other people. Thus, the violence in mass-media influences the behavior of children in an indirect way, through the impact it has on learning values and attitudes. Maybe not all the children become violent but they will tolerate easily the violent behavior of others.

Having worked at a TV station in Romania for 4 years, I had the chance to monitor thousand of mesages from viewers regarding the content of the TV shows. Many mesages reflected the fear of the public that the TV might transform in a „school of crime and delinquency”. Young people have the tendency to reproduce the behavior models seen on TV, which in many cases are in contradiction with the normal socio-moral values. Mass-media does not promote in a suficient way the moral standards accepted in the society, or it presents distorted versions of these norms. This only produces aditional confusion regarding the aceptable norms in the society.

I consider that the frequency of violence showing as a common fact on TV allows for unnoticed, disimulated learnig of sofisticated agresivity techniques by the viewers. The media violence afects the cognitive, axiologic and afective of the psychic, a result of presenting the violent world as a normal one. In the same time, media violence de-sensitizes the receivers (viewers) with respect to the victims.
The psycho-social traits, the atitudes and opinions of the individuals, the socio-cultural context, reference gropus, the weakening of the social control and the economical situation determines the way the media violence is perceived.

According to the Research on the Effects of Media Violence article I bring to your attention, family has an importnat role in order to diminish the negative impact of media on the children. The nocive character of the messages is corelated with existing situations in family and society, situations which can not be ignored or omited. The negative influences of mass-media are exerted especially in unstable relations between individuals and their environment, in situation of social dezintegration, of uncertain normative and value, of an exacerbated spocial tensions and conflicts, of insecurity, poverty and unfulfilled expectations, of frusttration and marginalization.

Conjugating these messages with the mediatic mesage increases the negative impact of mass-media on violence. Klapper (1960) is a supporter of the theory which presents mass-media aggresivity as an enhancing factor of innate agressivity of individuals. He supports the idea that mass-media violence does not directly contribute to the increase in aggresivity but activates the existing inclination of the individual.

The perception of the aggresive message varies from one individual to the other, in function of the measure in which norms and cultural values, social roles and personal characteristics are determined for the violent behaviour. Thus, violent images on the screen can enhance the norms established in the violent individual. In the same time, the non-violent person will select the aggresive images and will perceive only the messages that fit his/her non-violent norms. According to this theory, violent broadcasts and shows act upon the behavior of unbalanced, unstable and less socially integrated individuals.

I consider that it is dificult to establish a direct causal and incontestable relation between the violent behavior and mass-media but a thing is for sure, that mass-media represents a promoting factor of this behavior.
This thing is more opbvious when it is about young people. Even from the beginning of the life, mass-media plays a fundamental role in the genesis of conceptions, in the development of ideas, in structuring the perceptions and thoughts and along his/her development, the child has the tendency to separate herself from the values and norms transmitted by the family and to become more receptive to the values promoted and presented in mass-media. We cannot say that television or mass-media in general invent the violence. They only put it on the stage and help in presenting it in the houses of the individuals, who receive and assimilate it according to their own ste of values and norms.

I conclude by supporting the idea that, despite the idea that mass-media is capable of inciting to violence, they also have the potential to prevent violent behaviour. This is because mass-media plays a primordial role in informing the individual and it has the potential to employ the attention of the public to the complex aspects of violence. By sensitizing the viewers to the problems related to violence, mass-media has the role of stimulating the public to become a more sofisticated consumer of information and to benefit of its educational potential.

I invite you to say your opinion regarding the impact of mass-media violence on the public and especially on the children.

Some supplementary materials

Since this issue of video games causing violence is so interesting to me, I found some blogs of individuals who discuss it.

After you read them, you will realize that our children are all destined to become pirates.

Blog 1

Blog 2

Blog 3

Blog 4

Lose the hierarchies. The issue is individual choice.

Whatever media you consume is your own fault. Any action you take is your responsibility.

Video games definitely would not cause as much violent behavior as violent film or television, but both are not the primary cause of violence itself. If media was not present, violence would still occur. (Cain and Abel anyone?) The correlation and "judgment" on media violence for creating violence is weak at best. This is especially true with video games.

Take the example of Grand Theft Auto. In my opinion, that is a horrible video game. I have only watched someone play it for five minutes before I thought it was pointless, but from reading about it and seeing it then, it really is essentially pointless. The objectives in the game to "gain" anything by completing missions for drug dealers and gangsters are not entertaining to me. I play plenty of video games, but I choose which ones I play. Even though Grand Theft Auto is a horrible game with tons of violence and sexual content, I have no problem with someone choosing to play it. That is their decision. If they want to take pipes to people's heads and shoot cops in a video game, that is their business. The argument that this causes violent behavior is ridiculous.

The issue isn't that video games cause violence. It is the potential addiction and isolation of the individual that causes their social behaviors to suffer, and in turn lead to irrational actions like violence. One cannot argue despite this chain I just laid out that video games cause violence because ANYTHING someone is addicted to can cause irrational social behaviors. Alcohol, sex, television, and drugs are some of many examples of potentially addictive behaviors. If someone plays a single player video game first person shooter in their basement in the dark and CHOOSES to do so, and then the player chooses to shoot someone in real life to solve one's problems, both of those, in my opinion, are two separate choices and not interrelated. Even though the player may draw on past experience [video game] in the decision to shoot someone in reality, one still has to choose whether or not to pull the trigger. To be cliche, guns don't kill people, people kill people.

In all of the articles arguing about media violence, the common thread is this black and white absolute of "keep them on the market as is" or "get rid of them permenantly". Both of these solutions make no sense. This, like many issues in reality and life, is not something that can be solved one way or the other.

In arguments like this, individuals feel they know the point of view of all the population involved. Dr. Anderson feels that video games are horrible things that cause violence, while the Economist is relatively ambivalent to video games. Like government structure, or any hierarchy, these individuals want to make the choice for us. It is not for these people to choose. Why should things be censored when one has the choice on whether to consume the media itself? (Keep in mind I am not talking about media in the public square, like a billboard. I am talking about media from the television, video games, and movie films, and internet as well) If someone wants to be a porn guru, that is their choice. I think that is a bad choice, personally, but who am I to tell someone not to download porn? Why should I be the one to tell someone else what one can and cannot choose? Wasn't America built on the idea that it's the civic responsibility for the individual to choose what is good for oneself?

There is a way to solve this argument. All the information and research should be put out there in the public square so anyone can access it. If someone doesn't want to research or think about this issue, that is their business. If someone does, that person will have the information one would need in order to make an informed decision. No hierarchy or censor board should inhibit any video game, or any media, since at the end of the day the controller is in your hands, not theirs.