Ch. 4 Ethics

1. Ch. 4 Ethics

2. "Help Wanted" • "Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in case of success. Ernest Shackleton.” London Papers, 1920

3. Ethics • Derived from the Greek word “Ethos” • Means “way of living” • Values that matter to us • Ideas and beliefs we respect and hold special • Moral obligations • Rules for deciding right and wrong • Code of conduct • Behavior

4. Importance of Ethics • Indian scriptures attribute great importance to ethics • Inner desire • Correspond to basic human needs • Also comes from religious, environmental and other social groups • Create credibility with the public • Aid better decision making

5. Importance of Ethics • Can ethics be taught? • Passed on? • Imbibed? • Propogated?

6. Advertising Ethics • Applied philosophical analysis of nature of advertisement in general • Analysis of specific ethical issues that arise in a particular advertisement • The ethical premise for each organisation varies based on: • Company’s mission and vision • Corporate policy • Marketing objectives • Competition • Resources

7. Advertising Ethics • Stress importance of moral and values • Honest and truthful claims • Fulfill the norms of statutory authorities in advertising approvals • Follow a value oriented framework • Define purpose: spreading awareness + protect consumer from economic and physical harm

8. Unethical advertising • Degrades or underestimates the substitute or competitor’s product • Gives false or misleading information on the value of the product • Fails to give useful information on the possible reaction or side effects of the product • Immoral

9. Case Study • Advertising tobacco and alcohol is not permitted since consumption of these commodities leads to adverse medical, social and psychological issues • Direct advertising of tobacco and alcohol has been prohibited by enforcement of National Legislation

10. Case Study • Sponsorship of sports and movie events (Wills World cup, Gold Flake Tennis Tournament, Chivas Regal Polo Championship, Manikchand Filmfare Awards)

11. Examples • Thumbs Up ad • Mc Donald’s • Memory Plus • Dabur Amla Hair Oil

12. Ethical issues • Ads destroy freedom of choice or give more choice? • Ads destroy democracy and freedom of mass media or propagate freedom of speech and expression? • Wraps social values or reflects the real world?

13. Advertising Ethics and Racial Minorities • Racially disadvantaged groups targeted • "Smooth Dude" Joe Camel cigarettes campaign by R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company • Suzuki Samurai • Pan Parag • Minto Fresh

14. Advertising Ethics and Racial Minorities • More likely to find minority models for “everyday” product categories i.e. gum, electronic goods, cigarettes, cars • Not the main character, but blend in the crowd • Part of the background • “Everyone” is part of the main message: to appeal to wide range of target audience

15. Advertising Ethics and Racial Minorities • Fashion advertisements are less likely to have minority models: exception-supermodels • Women’s magazines are more likely to have advertisements with minority models • Female models are more prominent than male models

16. Interracial couples seen as trendy and for the younger generation, a trend that started in the mid-1990’s • 1996 Ikea • – “the outfitter for every style” • – TV ad which showed an interracial couple discussing efforts to conceive a child • – An “advertising breakthrough”

18. Current Scenario • Shock value of interracial couples is wearing off • More integrated advertisements overall • Minorities are not in decision making roles in advertising • Advertisers are ignoring the minority market, despite population and buying power growth

19. Advertising and RacialDistribution • Advertisers balance race with regards to product endorsements • E.g. athletes in product endorsements • Women in diamond jewellery ads

20. Women in Advertising • Media portrays women in debilitating, demeaning and inaccurate ways • It presents women as flawless, decorative objects, dependent on men and it ignores the complexity of women’s lives.

21. Women Dependent on MenWomen’s Place is at Home

22. Stereotypes • Women’s place is at home • Women need to depend upon men • Women do not make independent decision • Women view themselves and are viewed as sex objects.

23. Women are Decorative/Sex Objects

24. Women are Shown… • Women are shown as less authoritative, active, powerful, rational, decisive, and more concerned with youth and with their attractiveness. • Women are depicted as less intelligent than men and tend to have subservient occupations.

25. Beauty Myth • Models present a new “ melting pot” of beauty ( all colors, all creeds, all ethnicity -and all still young, thin, and flawless). • Advertising portray women as white with white standards of beauty derived from myths of whiteness.

26. Women are Flawless

27. Thin is BeautifulThinness is Associated with Health

28. Ads and Articles in 48 Women’s Vs. 48 Men’s Magazines Female: Green Male: Blue Alcoholic Bev

29. Real or Not? Real Not

30. Children and Advertising • FTC Guidelines • “When representations or sales practices are targeted to a specific audience, such as children, the elderly, or the terminally ill, the Commission determines the effect of the practice on a reasonable member of that group.”

31. Exposure to ads • Most exposure to ads is through tv commericals • • Kids watch an average of 28 hours of tv a week • (that’s ~1100 hours a year)! • • Kids are exposed to an average of 20,000 • commercials/yr • • How much of Saturday morning advertising is • devoted to sugary cereals, candy bars, and other • junk food? • 90% !

32. Prevalence of advertising tokids

33. No escape!

34. Money spent on children’sadvertising • $2 billion is spent annually on advertising to • children • • Advertising spending aimed at children has • increased by 2000% over the past 10 years. • • No wonder! Children’s influence on family spending: • – 1960: $5 billion • – 1984: $50 billion • – 1997: $177 billion • – 2001: $290 billion

35. And it’s not only $ • – Increasing involvement of child • psychologists and cognitive scientists • – No guidelines for psychologists working • in advertising • – e.g. Saatchi & Saatchi: “We used child psychologists to interview kids around the country, with the idea of getting at the psychological underpinnings of kids’ relationship with digital technology, not just what they’ll tell you on the surface”

36. Suggestive relationships… • • Children’s tastes and perceived needs reflect the • content of the programs they watch: • – food preferences (Atkin & Gibson, 1978) • • Exposure to cigarette and alcohol ads: • – Adolescents who recall more alcohol ads at 15 drink • more at 18 (Connolly et al, 1994) • – 2X as many children as adults able to associate Joe • Camel with Camel cigarettes and find ads appealing • (DiFranza et al, 1991) • – In adolescents, exposure to tv alcohol ads more strongly correlated with drinking than other demographic factors (Atkin, Hocking & Block, 1984)

37. Linguisticand cognitive competence to evaluateadvertisements • 1) Recognition of intent • Commercials as speech acts: • – Agent—entity whose intent the message represents • – Scriptor—entity who designs the form of the utterance • – Actor—entity who physically realizes the message • In commercials, the agent and scriptor are invisible • Adults typically understand when they are confronted • with a persuasive act • 􀃆Can children distinguish between programs and • commercials? • 􀃆Do they understand the purpose of advertising?

38. 2) Linguistic issues • Do children interpret language used by advertisers in the same way as adults? • -Do children extract the same denotational meaning as adults? • -Do children make the same pragmatic inferences as adults? • TV advertising targeted at young children does not stand the most fundamental rule of advertising ethics: that advertisements should be easily recognizable as such, • namely by those who form the target group.

39. Self-Regulatory Guidelines forChildren’s Advertising • Seven Principles: • 1. Advertisers should take into account the level of • knowledge, sophistication and maturity of their audience • 2. Advertisers should exercise care not to exploit • unfairly the imaginative quality of children • 3. Products and content inappropriate for use by • children should not be advertised or promoted directly to children • 4. Advertisers should communicate information in a • truthful and accurate manner and in language • understandable to young children

40. 5.Advertisers are urged to capitalize on the potential of • advertising to influence behavior (for good!) • 6. Care should be taken to incorporate minority and • other groups in advertisements • 7. It remains the prime responsibility of parents to • provide guidance for children. Advertisers should • contribute to this parent-child relationship in a • constructive manner

41. Arguments for and againstregulation • Against: • – Educative aspect of exposure to advertising • – Ads as necessary part of maturation process • – Needed for development of critical approach to • advertising later in life • • For: • – Children are not as cognitively sophisticated as • adults and need external protection

42. Sex In Advertising

43. Sex in advertising in the twentieth century has been on a steady increase since the late 1980’s. • The increase since the late 1980’s has caused an increase in product sales and has not broken the stereotypes of sexes. • Sex will be defined as both using sexuality to sell a product and also as using a male or female to sell a product.

44. People are more likely to buy products • advertised by the same sex • 􀁺 People are less likely to buy products • advertised by the opposite sex • 􀁺 People are more likely to buy a product • because of a spokes-character • 􀁺 People are more likely to remember • advertisements with sexual innuendos