Monday, November 18, 2013

Why do Alcohol and Tobacco Companies target Teens as their targets for advertisements?


            No matter how strong a family has their beliefs on tobacco and alcohol use; there is always one place where a child of teen can be influenced to want to try alcohol and tobacco while they are at home. The place they go to for this is the television. In between shows on certain stations, there will be a rotation of commercials that will advertise one of the products. Even though the commercial doesn’t come off and just straight up say they are targeting kids, you can tell that is what they are intending.
            So why do these companies target kids/teens? Study’s show that the developing brain in children are more likely to favor influences that portray a “good time” or in other words, the most fun option. When a company makes a beer commercial for example, they will have an attractive woman in the commercial so they can target teenage boys. This is called sexual appeal, because the boys will want beer because they will believe the two (beer and women) go together. Another reason they target this younger age is because they know their product is addictive, and they want to maximize the amount of time a customer can use their product before side effects kick in and prevent them from using. Meaning they want as much money from the customer as possible before they realize how deadly it actually is.
Nick E W

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