Jessica
Davis
Advertising is all around us. Our days are filled with a constant bombardment of commercials and advertisements; they are plastered all over the boxes of cereal we eat our breakfast from, blaring from our car radios during the morning commute, popping up viciously all over our computers, staring down at us from billboards on the way home, and interrupting our TV shows as we try to unwind from a long day of being commercial targets. Whether we realize it or not, we are so frequently exposed to advertisements that their affects begin to get ingrained into our brains and shape our behavior, habits, and desires. Unfortunately, advertisers have abused this power and continue to purposefully create commercials that influence us towards unhealthy choices. Advertising’s negative effects can be detrimental to consumer health by conditioning people in favor of addictive habits, creating unrealistic body expectations, and influencing people, especially children, to crave unhealthy foods.
Advertising is all around us. Our days are filled with a constant bombardment of commercials and advertisements; they are plastered all over the boxes of cereal we eat our breakfast from, blaring from our car radios during the morning commute, popping up viciously all over our computers, staring down at us from billboards on the way home, and interrupting our TV shows as we try to unwind from a long day of being commercial targets. Whether we realize it or not, we are so frequently exposed to advertisements that their affects begin to get ingrained into our brains and shape our behavior, habits, and desires. Unfortunately, advertisers have abused this power and continue to purposefully create commercials that influence us towards unhealthy choices. Advertising’s negative effects can be detrimental to consumer health by conditioning people in favor of addictive habits, creating unrealistic body expectations, and influencing people, especially children, to crave unhealthy foods.
Addictive products are often
advertised in ways that make them seem appealing. Many alcohol commercials show
people drinking socially at fun outdoor events that appeal to teenagers.
Another type of alcohol commercial features “The Most Interesting Man in the
World,” a classy and sophisticated Dos Equis drinker who lives an exciting and
glamorous life full of beautiful women and beer. Most adults already have
established drinking habits, so these commercials serve largely to attract new
young drinkers. In fact, alcohol drinkers are now starting their habits at a
younger age than ever before. According to the study Trends and Underage Drinking in the United States, most underage
drinkers now begin at age fourteen, down from almost eighteen in the 1960’s
(News-Adeyi, G.; Chen, C.M.; Williams, G.D.; and Faden V.B. 7-8). Though TV and
radio ads for cigarettes were banned in the U.S. in 1970 by the Public Health
Cigarette Smoking Act, people are still faced with cigarette advertisements
every time they pass a gas station or convenience store with windows and
counters plastered with cigarette signs. Because few adults randomly take up
smoking, cigarette advertising is aimed towards making children and teens
become a generation of new customers.
Advertising can have a dangerous
effect on consumer’s self-imageand self-esteem by creating false images that
perpetuate unrealistic body expectations. It is rare to find an advertisement
with a model that has not been at least slightly airbrushed and altered. These
digitally enhanced images usually remove every imperfection from a model’s
body, and sometimes even remove normal features like collarbones, muscle
contours, and curves around female hips. Frequently, images are so drastically
altered that they show body proportions that are almost impossible, and
certainly unhealthy, to obtain. The multi-national clothing chain H&M was
recently criticized for taking digital model enhancement to the next level by
photoshopping the heads of actual models onto computer generated bodies. Models
are unrealistic even before the computer editing. In fact, the average female
American model is 5’11” and weighs 117 lbs. whereas the average American woman
is only 5’4” and weighs in at 140 lbs. Young women and girls are especially
susceptible to the detrimental effects of these false body images, and often
fall victim to conditions like bulimia and anorexia as they struggle to make
their bodies look like the bodies of models that aren’t even real.
Perhaps
the most severe negative health influence stemming from advertising is on our
diets. Once again, children are the most susceptible to this. Kids’ TV
programming is full of commercials for sugary junk foods and highly processed
fatty snacks. Even healthy foods are repackaged into “fun” and convenient
on-the-go forms. For example, instead of eating a healthy apple, consumers have
the option of buying pre-sliced apples which come with caramel dip. Supermarket
breakfast cereal aisles constantly have the plainly packaged healthy cereals up
high, and the sugary cereals down low at children’s eye level, plastered with
fun and colorful characters and mascots, easily recognizable from their
commercials. Brand recognition is a powerful influence over eating habits. Fast
food franchises like McDonald’s offer the comfort of familiar food in a quick,
easy, and affordable manner, while at the same time tempting children with toys
and playspaces. In his study, “Review of Research on the Effects of Food
Promotion to Children,” Professor Gerard Hastings states that advertising
influences children towards a diet that is less healthy than the recommended
one, and that advertising influences children’s’ preferences regarding what
they will consume (3-4). Furthermore, food products are often misleadingly
labeled to make them sound healthy. Empty terms like “new,” “improved,” and
“lite,” are thrown around constantly with little meaning behind them. William Lutz describes these in an excerpt
from his book, Doublespeak, titled
“With These Words, I Can Sell You Anything,” as weasel words. “…Examine weasel
words closely and you’ll find that they’re as hollow as any egg sucked by a
weasel” (1).
Advertising
is so much more than just selling a product. Marketers strive to change
society’s opinions, habits, and preferences, and to affect each and every
person on such an extreme level that new habits and beliefs get ingrained
deeply in us from childhood. These subliminal influences have led to a cultural
acceptance of addictive substances, harmful ideas of body image, and poor eating
habits. In an essay titled “The Language of Advertising,” the author explains
the importance of being informed consumers. We are not required to buy products
just because we are surrounded by their commercials, but we should be aware of
the effect that they have on us. We must pay attention and do our own thinking,
instead of mindlessly trusting advertisements (O’Neill). Most importantly, we
must be aware of the harmful effects of advertising on our health, so that we
are prepared to avoid them. While advertising may be extremely useful for
companies to sell their products and create vast legions of loyal consumers, it
is dangerous to the well-being of society as a whole.
