Toy Advertising & The Impression Minds of Youth

Advertising has caused toys to become a increasingly large sales product in the last twenty years. Advertising toys makes it possible to send out numerous messages to children. Toy companies take advantage of how impressionable young minds are and use the powerful images of television to create an idea of the identity that children are meant to acquire. Commercials relate many signs about society that children either consciously or subconsciously learn. These signs will be explored further by examining sources from other authors and by extrapolating this information with personal opinions and insights.

The toy industry has realized what a powerful buying block youth represent. According to Guber/Berry, "Kids are a major consumer market. Their total spending power is around $150 billion a year" (18). Guber/Beny also note that the youth of the 90's "are active consumers and influencers for themselves and for the family" (17). Therefore, as is noted by Carlsson-PaigeALevin, "Toy manufacturers spend millions of dollars on television advertising targeted at children in an effort to influence their early consumer habits" (83). Carlsson-PaigeALevin go on to say:

Young children in the United States are now the target of sophisticated marketing strategies designed to exploit children and pressure parents. The new partnership between toy manufactures and the television industry is transforming the way children play and the way children view the world. It has taken the control of children's play environment away from them and from their parents. (84)

Parents and children will undoubtedly suit themselves, and argue between themselves as to what they want to buy. They will not be over detemined by the particular commercial, but the range of what they will think about is increasingly influenced, even confined by what they see on television. (190)

Sutton-Sniith seems to be expressing that parents and children still have control over what they choose to buy although he does see that television programs and advertisements play a role in constructing an impression and thought process about the real world for young and mature minds alike.

There are different views on the effects of advertising on children. Sutton-Smith notes two views of advertising by observing a "nice contrast between those who stand to make money out of advertising, saying that it is harn-dess, and those who stand to lose money, saying it is harmful" (I 89). This is saying that there is a fundamental difference between the way advertising messages are viewed by "consumer advocates" and "marketers". These differences are explained in detail by Sutton-Smith:

In general, consumer advocates insist that advertising can unduly persuade and manipulate the unsophisticated child; that advertising encourages the child to pressure parents to buy things and that advertising can imbue such undesirable values as materialism, as the need to consume, and as irrational consumer decision-making. On the other hand, the marketers content that advertising mainly reinforces existing opinions; that parents have a key role in decision making; that advertising can result in a positive interaction between parent and child as an occasion for learning about consumption; and that advertising only reflects the value system of the society and prepares the child for the role of consumer. (I 89)

From the research presented by Sutton-Smith, "the data show that the younger children (those under six years) do not easily distinguish between programs and commercials; that in fact most of them (over one half) trust, like, and want to see commercials" (189-190). However, Sutton-Smith notes that as children grow older, they begin to trust television less, perhaps due to "the failure of purchased items" (190). One must question what sort of effect the trust and belief in television and advertisements at a young age has on children in the long

run. Is this something that effects their life-long role as consumers?

Answers to this question come in several different forms. According to Carlsson-PaigeALevin, toy advertisements "undemiined children's basic sense of self-sufficiency in play" (84). Carlsson-Paige/Levin write that this occurs because "every toy had one specific function so a child would have to buy lots of them in order to play" (84) and that "once they (the toys) have been used in the intended way and the novelty wears

off, it's hard to figure out what to do with them next- how to use them in a creative and imaginative way" (84). Sutton-Smith also notes toys as novelty. In a survey included by Sutton-Smith, "the average number of toys in the one-year-old's bedroom was 28 and for the six-year-old it was 91 " (176). Later, Sutton-Sn-iith describes how this mass quantity of toys could be viewed:

A socialist cynic would say that in addition to teaching children capitalist habits of consumption and waste, and teaching children to grow up with their self-esteem tied to the receiving of novel and unnecessary gifts or toys, we are also teaching them the addiction of novelty. By constantly changing the toys presented to children, it might be said we are educating them in distraction; teaching them never to pay enduring attention to any particular thing, because other more novel items will soon arrive. (187)

On the other hand, Sutton-Smith acknowledges another point of view which is that "toy novelty is also a kind of information and a kind of learning" (188). This perspective believes that "children are being habituated to the constant barrage of ever-changing stimulating in toys because that is also a feature of late 20th century living" (189).

From observing actual toy commercials that are currently being shown on television, several clear messages,

or signs, can be derived. The first of these messages relates to how toy advertising relates to gender. There is a large distinction between toys that are made for boys and toys that are made for girls when it comes to advertising. Boys commercials are filled with adventurous music and loud booming voices where as girls commercials have light, happy music. Colors that are used in toys, packaging, and commercials also reflect what gender the commercial is aimed at. Girls toys are advertised with colors such as pink, purple, and other pastels. Boys toys are advertised with dynamic colors like red, yellow, black, or primary colors. Commercials advertising toys for boys show powerful images such as fighting and action with cars, guns, super-heroes, action figures, etc. Commercials for girls, however, seem soft and peaceful featuring play kitchens and dolls. The overall sign of these gender stereotyped toy conunercials is that society still wants girls to grow up to be docile, soft individuals who are good mothers, house keepers, and wives, and boys to be strong, unfeeling, aggressive fighters.

D o the conunercials reflect existing differences between toy choices of girls and boys or do the commercials

and society influences cause these differences? Most sources seem to believe that toy preferences are both the results of "nurture and nature". According to Guber/Berry, "the process that results in children's adopting sexual roles and behavior appears to come from both nature and nurture, the interplay of genetics and socialization" (73). Sutton-Smith also expresses a similar opinion. Goldstein states that when children are

given a choice, "girls tend to choose dolls and household objects, and boys soldiers and trucks" (I 15). Goldstein goes on to discuss whether these differences are due to "biological" or "social" processes or a combination of both. Goldstein believes that television commercials do play a role in "sex role stereotypes"

(I 27). Goldstein reports that "children of all ages tended to identify the advertisements with girls' features as female and those with features from commercials for boys as male"(127) when shown two types of commercials, "one containing clusters of features that appeared mainly in advertisements for boys and one with features appearing in advertisements for girls" (127). Children are developing identities and they model their behavior after what they can identify with. This would explain why girls and boys choose different toys; they are trying to model their behavior with what is shown to be acceptable.

Toy commercials also show other signs unrelated to gender. Some commercials show children showing a particular toy to an adult figure and the adult always smiles and seems pleased. This is a sign to children that this is a toy that their parents will be happy to buy. Toy commercials also show the featured children playing with other children (usually of the same sex). This is a message to children that they will have someone to play with if they own the toy. Another strong message in toy commercials is that one of the toy is not enough. This observation correlates to the writings of Carlsson-Paige/Levin. Typically, a toy is not featured alone. It is advertised with either accessories, other similar toys that can be purchased from the same company, or addition materials that make the toy seem more exciting. An actual example of this is from an advertisement for "Polly Pocket"(a niiniature doll). This advertisement provided a message of incentive to their target audience of young girls to want to buy at least ten Polly Pocket sets so they could receive free dolls through the mail.

Children are an extremely vulnerable audience. At young ages, children are searching for images that will help them develop an identity. Toy advertising limits a child's ability to discriminate between who they want to be and what they are told they should become. This limited freedom in shaping their identity is going to have an impact upon their future. The unresponsive and indifferent trend exhibited by teenagers of today may be due to an identity crisis caused by the inability to develop a character on their own during childhood. Children must be given more freedom to determine who they are without the strong influences that advertising places upon their minds.