Advertising, Effects on Children

Cognitive-Effects Studies

Cognitive-effects studies fall apart into two subtypes. A first subtype focuses on children's ability to distinguish commercials from television programs and their ability to understand the selling intent of advertising. Most of these studies have adopted Piaget's theory of cognitive development to guide their research (e.g., Wartella & Ettema, 1974). These studies have demonstrated that children who are at Piaget's preoperational stage (2–7 years) respond differently to commercials than do children at the concrete operational stage (7–12 years). It has been shown, for example, that from 7 years onward, children are progressively more able to distinguish commercials from television programs and show a better understanding of the persuasive intent of commercials.

A second subtype of cognitive-effects studies investigates the influence of advertising on children's brand awareness. Brand awareness is usually investigated by showing children brand logos or brand characters and then measuring the extent to which they recognize or recall the relevant brands. Brand recognition is investigated by showing children brand logos or characters and then asking them to which brand or product a particular logo best fits. The children can choose from a number of options. In the case of brand recall, the children have to name the brand spontaneously while looking at the logos or characters.

Both correlational and experimental research into children's brand recognition has found that television advertising stimulates children's brand recognition (e.g., Fischer, Schwartz, Richards, Goldstein, & Rojas, 1991). However, research into the brand recall of children has come up with far less clear results. In a study by Ward, Wackman, and Wartella (1977), children of 4 to 12 years of age were asked to name as many brands as possible from a particular product group. They were asked, for example, to name as many brands of toothpaste as possible. Although most brands that were named were advertised frequently on television, the relationship between watching television and brand recall was not significant. Also, in another study that investigated children of different ages, no positive relationship was found among children from 4 to 14 years of age (Atkin, 1975).

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