Page 1 of 6
Journal for Studies in Management and
Planning
Available at
http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/
ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 04 Issue 01
January 2018
Available online: http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/ P a g e | 259
Parent’s Perception about the Stakeholders Role in
Minimizing the Negative Effects of Television
Advertising on Children in India
Dr. T. Mallikarjuna Raju
Associate Professor, School of Management Studies, Joginpally B.R. Engineering College,
Hyderabad, India
E-mail: tmkraju@rediffmail.com
Abstract: This study examined Indian
parent’s perception about the stakeholders
role in minimizing the negative effects of
television advertising on children. A survey
had been conducted on 3600 parents from 6
selected cities with the aid of structured
questionnaire. Children age group was 7 to
11 years. Tabulation of data was used to
analyze the study results. Marketers stood
top followed by School, Parents, and
Government in the role of minimizing the
negative effects of television advertising on
children as per the Parent’s perceptions. The
need of the hour is an integrated approach by
involving all stakeholders in regulating the
advertising to protect the children against
negative effects of television advertising.
Keywords: Children advertising, Advertising
regulations, advertising negative effects, Role
of marketers, Role of Government
1. INTRODUCTION
Children exposure to television
commercials has exponentially grown in the
recent years due to the exclusive channels
targeted towards them. Increase in the number
of nuclear family structure, and lack of outdoor
sports facilities compelling the children to
spend more hours watching television
programs. According to Turner International
survey on 7000 children and parents across
India, television viewing activity ranks the
highest in media consumption at 97% among
the children. There are many negative effects on
children due to the exposure to television
commercials. The main areas of negative
effects of advertising on children are increase in
purchase requests, parent-child conflict,
unhappiness, unhealthy eating habits, increase
in materialistic attitude and values, and
increased negative self perception.
2. Literature Review
Television commercials promote poor
health behaviors and knowledge among the
children (Signorielli& Lears, 1992). Children’s
advertising exposure will create materialism
(Greenberg & Brand, 1993; Liebert, 1986;
Wulfemeyer &Mueller, 1992) and purchase
requests among them which are treated as
negative effects (Buijzen & Valkenburg, 2003a,
2003b). Advertising exposure creates parent- child conflicts which is an unintended effect
(Atkin, 1980; Robertson, 1979). Advertising
exposure also creates negative self-perception
Page 2 of 6
Journal for Studies in Management and
Planning
Available at
http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/
ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 04 Issue 01
January 2018
Available online: http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/ P a g e | 260
particularly among young female adolescents
(Martin & Kennedy, 1993). Research suggests
that advertising may cause unhappiness in
children due to the mismatch between the real
world and advertising world filled with
beautiful people and desirable products
(Atkin,1980; Richins,1991; Martin and
Kennedy, 1993) and when products do not meet
the children expected performance (Atkin,1980;
Robertson et al.,1985; Ward et al., 1977).
Parents’ active mediation and concept-oriented
family communication pattern were most
effective on children in reducing the negative
effects of advertising namely materialism,
purchase requests, and conflicts with their
parents (Buijzen and Valkenburg, 2005).
Young, B., De Bruin, A., & Eagle, L. (2003)
conducted a study to find the attitude of parents
from United Kingdom, Sweden, and New
Zealand about children exposure to television
commercials. Many parents expressed concern
about their children over exposure to television
commercials resulting into pestering the parents
to buy unwanted products. Parents opined the
inability of children in understanding of
television commercials and need for strict
regulations of television commercials.
Furnham, A. (2000) opined that rather than
strict advertising regulations parents can
intervene in children understanding of
television advertisements. Craggs, C. E. (1992)
suggested that schools should help the children
in understanding the advertisements through the
participative activities. Media Smart (2007)
found that though children have considerable
understanding about advertising they lack
access to teachers to discuss about the
advertisements not properly understood by
them. Brown, J. A. (2001) media literacy needs
critical viewing skills with respect to
aesthetical, social, cultural, psychological,
educational, economic, and regulatory aspects
of television programs. Dorr, A., Graves, S. B.,
& Phelps, E. (1980) proved advertising literacy
programs helps the children in better
understanding of television advertisements.
Schlesinger, P. R. (1995) analyzed the
differences in advertising regulations from
country to country are due to the prevailing
political, social, and cultural systems. Dibb, S.
(1996) expressed concern about the functioning
of regulatory bodies in controlling the
promotion of unhealthy eating habits among the
children in United Kingdom. Adams, J., Tyrrell,
R., Adamson, A. J., & White, M. (2012) studied
the exposure of children to high fat, salt or
sugar (HFSS) advertising by implementing
scheduling restrictions. Since the restrictions
did not met the objectives it is recommended to
explore further interventions to reduce the
quantum of unhealthy food advertising
exposure to the children. There is strong
evidence that television advertising influences
the food and beverage preferences and purchase
requests among the children aged 2-11 years
causing diet related health issues (McGinnis et
al., 2006). Students improved their knowledge
in many components of advertising literacy
including source of advertising, selling
intention of advertisements, persuasive strategy,
and target audience due to the implementation
of advertising literacy classes in schools (
Nelson, 2016). Interventions through activities
related to understanding of advertising in
schools empowered the children as consumers
Page 3 of 6
Journal for Studies in Management and
Planning
Available at
http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/
ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 04 Issue 01
January 2018
Available online: http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/ P a g e | 261
in dealing with advertisements (del Mar Pàmies
et al., 2016).
3. Research Methodology
A survey was conducted on parents from 6
selected cities (Hyderabad, Kolkata,
Mumbai, Indore, Delhi, and Guwahati) with
the aid of structured questionnaire with a
sample size of 3600. Children age group was
7 to 11 years. From each city total of ten
schools were selected through convenience
sampling. Internal consistency of the
constructs were measured through the
Cronbach’s alpha value and found acceptable
with a value greater than 0.7. Results were
tabulated in a table to analyze the parents
perceptions about the stakeholders role in
minimizing the negative effects of television
advertising on children.
Total sample size = 6 (cities) X 10 (Number of
schools) X 5 (Number of classes) X 12
(Parent’s of the students) = 3600 parents.
4. Data Analysis
Out of 3600 distributed questionnaires,
3108 questionnaires were found to be fully
filled, and the rest 492 questionnaires were
discarded due to incomplete information.
96.2% of parents expressed their opinion that
marketers should design the advertisements
to avoid the negative influence on children
according to the research results. This
indicates the growing concern of parents
towards their children about the unintended
effects of advertisements on them like poor
health behaviors (Signorielli& Lears, 1992),
materialism (Greenberg & Brand, 1993;
Liebert, 1986; Wulfemeyer &Mueller, 1992),
Table 1: Parent’s perception about the
stakeholders role in minimizing the
negative effects of television advertising on
children
N = 3108 Rank by % of agreement
Statements
Agree
Neither agree nor
disagree
Disagree
1 Marketers should
design advertisements
that do not create
negative influence on
children
96.2% 3.8% 0%
2 School should conduct
consumer awareness
programs to students for
proper understanding of
the advertising
messages
83.4% 5.7% 10.9%
3 Parents should help
their children in proper
understanding of
advertising messages
78.2% 21.5% 0.3%
4 Government should
regulate the advertising
industry to reduce the
negative influence of
advertisements on
children
63.1% 23.6% 13.3%
negative self-perception (Martin & Kennedy,
1993), and unhappiness (Atkin,1980;
Richins,1991; Martin & Kennedy, 1993).
Conducting consumer awareness programs
for children in school was the second important
interventions expressed by the parents with
83.4% agree. Past research (del Mar Pàmies et
al., 2016; Nelson,2016) also indicated children
