The Impacts of Advertising

Child Psychology – The Impacts of Advertising

In this course, Dr Cathal O’Siochru (Liverpool Hope University) explores the impact of advertising on children. In the first lecture, we think about how much advertising children are exposed to and the impacts it might have. In the second lecture, we think about persuasion and its role in advertising. In the third lecture, we think about how advertising can promote stereotypical views and the negative impacts for both the group(s) being stereotyped and the individual(s) exposed to them. Next, we think about how gender is represented in advertising. In the fifth and final lecture, we think about ways in which we can teach children to be more resilient to the influences of advertising.

The Impacts of Advertising

In this lecture, we think about how much advertising people are exposed to and what impact that might have, focusing in particular on: (i) the amount of time and number of different adverts we are exposed to on a daily basis; (ii) the role that schools play in exposing children to product and services advertising; (iii) findings by the APA, including that children under the age of five were unable to distinguish between adverts and programmes; (iv) the powerful impact that advertising of non-nutritious food products has on children’s liking and consumption of them; (v) the hierarchical model of advertising and Zajonc’s mere exposure effect.