Advertising aimed at adolescents

By William Foley

You just go ahead and try to spend a day without seeing an ad for something. It's next to impossible. Members of our so-called "Millennial Generation" find themselves affected (poisoned?) by an overwhelming media.

At this point, it appears as though the only leaders appearing to guide these teenagers are not leaders at all, but are in fact members of corporate America, companies that advertise to their receptive adolescent audience. Manipulative advertising aimed at this country's youth affects the generation's choices regarding not only the product, but also how they spend money, their attraction to addictives like cigarettes and their opinions about themselves and their peers.

Companies that wish to be successful must sell their product, and to do this they must advertise. The marketing world is battling for consumers, and in battle, no weapon is effective unless aimed properly. Luckily for companies today, our generation is the most affluent youth group in history, spending more money and controlling personal finances more than any previous generation. Teens are essential to corporate America, but how are these companies affecting their consumers?

Advertisements provide incentive to purchase products, even manipulating the consumer to buy a product he or she may not need, in order to make a profit. Teens appear easily swayed, constantly in search of products that will make them "cool." If they can make their product look cool, it will be accepted as part of the culture. This will motivate the company to further market the product, occasionally launching marketing campaigns to popularize the product. More teens will purchase the merchandise, and this will launch a trend. Unfortunately, after a while the product is no longer cool because it has been widely accepted, and in order to be cool, it must be revolutionary. So the company must pick up on new ideas that can be embraced in the same way. According to the PBS program Frontline, "the media watches kids and sells them an image of themselves. The kids watch the images and aspire to be that [boy or girl] in the TV set."

Unfortunately, this has negative results. "I think there is considerable evidence that this type of world does not produce happy people. This isn't really what people are meant to be, basically recipients of marketing messages to define themselves by purely commercial terms," Robert McChesney of said.

Teenagers seen as "uncool" because their style are often ostracized and considered unpopular. The struggle to be cooler than the commercial cool, the need to anticipate the next flavor-of-the-week fashion, often overcomes decency, any sense of uniformity or conformity, even the morality of the trend-seeker. An adolescent will go to extremes, wear scantier clothes, behave wildly and do almost anything to stand out.

One example is the tobacco industry, with its popular ads, well-known advertising icons (like the Marlboro Man or Joe Camel) and seemingly unlimited advertising budget. Cigarette companies spend more money on advertising than any other industry. "Cigarette sales increases 0.5 percent from 1999 to 2000, while advertising promotional expenditures rose 16.2 percent to $9.57 billion, the most ever reported by the commission," according to the Federal Trade Commission's 2002 report on the year 2000's expenses. This money is directed at youths, prime targets, and this has led to several million new teens tobacco addicts a year, as reported on www.thetruth.com. We are also more receptive to advertising, according to the American Journal of Psychiatry, in which R. Andrew Chambers writes that "Epidemiological studies indicate that experimentation with addictive drugs and onset of addictive disorders is primarily concentrated in adolescence and young adulthood."

The fashion industry is another trade in which consumer demand is influenced by advertising. The manufacturers of clothing and accessories strive to stay one step ahead, providing the newest eye-catching styles that will herald the next trend â€" this is the only way to succeed. "Adolescence can also be a tumultuous time of life when peer approval overrides all other matters. The move toward independence and the need for self-expression often translates into fashion" Brown University Child and Adolescent Behavior Letter said. Billboards and magazine ads for such fashions depict well-known celebrities or glamorous models living "cool" lives â€" lives made possible by the skimpy outfits, tight-fitting clothes or other marketable products. Teens emulate this glamorous lifestyle, and end up supporting the same manipulative industry that requires them to spend more money the next month. "Annie Grainger, 16, says she is wary of commercials and marketing, yet spends $50 a pop for body-piercing," Maclean's reported. "Eighteen-year-old Mike Landon proudly wears hip-hop clothes with the Phat Farm label and says: 'Show me a commercial that says 50 percent off â€" that's a good commercial to me.'"

Young people today are susceptible to the poisons of the media, and will embrace the newest trends that the advertising industry tells them they need for their own success. These adolescents will buy anything if it makes them "cool," and will sell their health or longevity to a cigarette company to gain that elite status. Teens are impressionable, and the advertising of today manipulates them, controlling them by controlling their desires.

û William Foley is a freshman.