Children and advertising: What do they think about advertisements, how are they affected by advertisements?

In all circumstances television advertisements affect children of different age and gender groups in terms of consumption. Because of the ease to affect and lead children, advertisers consider them as the target audience. Today, since television advertisements have an important and effective role in the conscious raising of children who will be socialized as the consumers of the future, we are confronted by the imperative to focus on television ads. For this reason, this study has been planned and conducted with the aim of determining the effects of television advertisements on primary school age children and understanding their attitude towards advertisements. The sample of this research is constituted by 225 students, who are selected by random sampling method from the 6^th, 7^th and 8^th grades of 5 primary schools within Ankara city territories. The results of the research show that girls watch more television advertisements than boys do (p < .05) and that the ratio of those who "always" watch television advertisements, decline with the increase in education level. Furthermore, at the end of the research it was found that children, be it a girl or a boy at any education level, want to possess the goods and services that they see on television advertisements. However, it was also seen that there is a high ratio of those who think that goods and services that they purchase sometimes carry the characteristics stated in the advertisements. Moreover, the findings of the research also indicate that while most of the children agree with the fact that advertisements are "entertaining" and "effective in shopping," a considerable number of children think that advertisements cause prodigality. More critical than that, findings pinpoint that the ratio of those who think that advertisements are "honest and real" decline while the ratio (p < .05) of those who think that advertisements are "misguiding and deceptive" increase with the increase in grade level.