Marketing and advertisements tailored for children is accounted to be a billion dollar project but is also said to have an immense impact on child development. It is an indisputable fact that children are naive; which naturally makes them vulnerable to exploitation.  

Marketing not only implements materialistic values among children but also creates the necessity to posses newly announced products, allowing them to always be at the forefront of trend. An arising issue regarding the morality of targeting children in this commercial world is the role of psychologists. It is an increasing case where psychologists  take part in creating marketing campaigns, which lead to solely benefiting the company rather than helping children. By targeting children using such schemes, marketers are imposing upon children’s right to autonomy and transparency.

Another noticeable fact is that children influence their parents spending by an average of $250 billion dollars a year. This can be used to argue how effective their marketing strategy is, from a marketing perspective. The video below is an advertisement for Mcdonald’s happy meal set, where parents are fighting over to want to give the toy to their child.

As a child, I have had the urge to go to Mcdonalds, not for the food but rather for the toys and excitement you receive from buying a happy meal. This marketing strategy may lead to children consuming an unhealthy diet, all because of the allurement of the toy. Mcdonalds has been accused for deceptive marketing in the past that induces children to want toys and in actual fact the food is beside the point.  Marketing is indeed a free tool, where  the campaign that can better allure consumers win, but should there exist campaigns that solely target children?  Advertising to children has been an ongoing controversy.  I believe although marketing is already integrated in our daily lives, children with the inability to have a say should not have to bare the mercenary and strategic nature of marketing campaigns.