Who's buying our children's childhood?

Do we agree?

Research done for Mothers' Unionhas found that the majority of parents

agree that media content and advertising seen by children can be

harmful to them.

How much media do kids see?

Does it surprise you that nearly 50% of 5 year olds have TV in their bedroom?

Physical healthChildren prefer the taste of food with

popular cartoon characters on the packaging compared with the same food without the cartoons.”Yale University 2008

Government has stopped the use of licensed characters and celebrities in ads for unhealthy food and drink

Does packaging affect the brands of food consumed in your family?

Do you think the brand makes a difference to your health?

For every additional hour of TV watched, a toddler will:

- spend less time doing physical activity- spend less time doing activities

involving physical effort- have a higher consumption of soft

drinks and snacks=> increase in body mass index

(Pediatric Adolescent Medicine 2010)

What do you do in front of the TV?

Mental health and wellbeing1/10 kids suffer mental health disorders in UK with a link to high media use materialism and dissatisfaction poor self-esteem

This appears to lead to higher levels of stress/anxiety lower self - satisfaction poorer relationships with others

Advertising Association say children are resilient to advertising

Which products do you feel your children are being pressurised to buy, or own?

Values

Children's values come from- parental role modelling- develop their own from wider society

Purpose of marketing is to manufacture want

Materialism can start to occurfrom age 7 – do you agree?

Life according to Disney:

Stories with moral messages of good

triumphing over evil

Activities that are aimed at activating our greed

What activities make your family happiest?

Understanding and developmentModern media has wide range of

educational use and opportunities.

But research shows- 22% boys and 13% girls struggle with

speech development because the TV is on

- The more TV a toddler watches the poorer their academic measurements aged 10

What would happen in your household

if the TV was turned off for an additional hour a day?

RelationshipsWho is this Chrysler

advert aimed at?

What does the Vauxhall advert

suggest about relationships

between adults and children?

“Pester power” stresses the parent/child relationship:

“Parents consider that their authority and capacity to manage their children’s behaviour is compromised by children’s

desires and increased expectations which they see as fuelled by

marketing”Independent Report for Dept of Education

In what ways do children's desires and expectations for goods and services affect relationships in your family?

80% of parents believe that films and video games with sexual or violent

themes can be accessed too easily by children;

80% also believe that television, films, magazines and the internet make children sexually aware at a

younger age than they would be otherwise.”

ComRes for Mothers' Union

Sexualisation

“The most common use of the internet for eight to 11 year olds in the UK is the

playing of online games.” Independent Report for Home Office

What subjects are appropriate for 8-

11 year olds to play as online

games?

What is the age difference between those who will play

with Bratz dolls, and the children the dolls portray?

Does it bother you?

Why?

What's good about the influence of modern media on children?

What concerns you most?

“Train children in the right way, and when old, they will not stray.”

Proverbs 22:6

What does this proverb suggest that might be applied to how adults encourage children to respond to marketing?

In order to ensure that childhood is not treated as simply another marketing

opportunity, Mothers' Union launched the Bye Buy Childhood Campaign

One of the aims of the campaign is to help families find ways of coping with

the pressures of the media on families.

What actions do we think we can take in our families to help us

cope with the issues we've discussed?

Unsubscribe

www.byebuychildhood.org

Challenge:- ourselves- marketeers and manufacturers- academics and local interest groups- regional and national government

www.byebuychildhood.com

www.themothersunion.org

www.muwinchester.org.uk