Teach your kids to be consumer conscious

In this issue, Leah Dobkin, mother of three teens, writes about losing control of her kids to corporate America, a fear many parents share. Find tips on how to regain control by teaching your kids about advertising and consumerism.

| April 2008 issue

It is estimated that children in this nation watch an average of 3.5 hours of television every day, the equivalent on an annual basis of a 50-day marathon of TV viewing. For pre-teen youngsters, "prime time" does not mean "Roseanne" and "Cheers." Instead, children are most likely to settle down in front of the television to take in the exploits of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or the Ghostbusters. Much of this viewing by children takes place on weekday afternoons and Saturday mornings, when parents are at work or even asleep. This guide has been prepared by the Children's Advertising Review Unit of the Council of Better Business Bureau (CARU) and is directed to partents of youngsters between two and 12 years old.

Helping your child to think about advertising

Television can be an important learning tool for your children, but it must be used with the greatest care. As part of the television "picture," advertising can provide your children with a great deal of information about the world around them. Advertising also may be a child's first introduction to what it means to be a consumer in this economy. Ads can help a child appreciate the diversity of available choices, and how to select wisely from among them. But, it must always be remembered that children need close parental guidance when it comes to advertising.

1) General concepts of advertising
It is useful with very young children to start by talking about the general concept of advertising. For the purposes of such a discussion, parents may want to clip and then refer to magazine or newspaper ads for starters. Show your child such a print ad and ask:

What do you notice first when you look at this ad?
What is pretty or ugly about this ad?
What product is this ad for?
How does that ad make you feel about the product?
What questions should you ask before buying this product?

Encourage your child to seek more information than the ad contains. How is the product used? Does it work well? Do you really need this particular product? What other comparable products are available and at what cost?

This line of questioning is guaranteed to spark a lively discussion! More importantly, it will serve to start your child out on the path to wise consuming. Children should know that the purpose of advertising is to get people interested in buying products, not to entertain the viewer or reader. Extend these discussions to television advertising. Talk about the ways in which the product is made attractive on the television screen. Assist your child in identifying the claims made in the ad and then sort the statements into two categories: fact and opinion. Ask your child to consider which of the claims can be "proven" and which cannot.

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