Marketing to Young Children
Recently, a famous restaurant food chain had preschoolers participate in a study showing how great an influence advertising has on the taste buds of young children. They discovered that even regular food tasted better when wrapped in its' signature trademark. Children sampled identical food from the establishment in both name-brand and unmarked wrappers; the unmarked foods always lost the test. The study involved 63 low-income kids from ages three to five years old. It is believed that the results probably would have been the same for children from wealthier families also.
One study author commented that the children's perception of taste had been "physically altered by the branding". The research for this study should appear in August Archives and Adolescent Medicine, and may create more debate concerning a movement to restrict advertising to young children. The before mentioned restaurant wants to promote meals containing fruit, and having less calories and less fat to kids.
Another individual believes this study says enough is not being done to reduce marketing towards children. It seems that advertisers want to create an almost "obsesssional desire for a particular brand-name product".
The restaurant's food items used included hamburgers, chicken nuggets, french fries, and store bought milk or juice and carrots. Each child received two identical samples of each food on a tray, one in the brand's wrappers or cups and the other in plain, unmarked packaging (some didn't taste all of the foods).
The bottom line is that the name-brand labeled samples were the clear favorites in every test. I wonder if this marketing strategy would work on older kids, teens, and adults too. By the way, I apologize if I made any of you hungry (ha ha).
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