Source: https://stacimorrison.com/research/first-amendment-food-marketing-children/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 03:57:24+00:00

Document:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances1.
Yet, since its adoption in 1791, there has been much debate on the interpretation of what constitutes “freedom of speech” and to whom it is entitled.2 One group of Americans about which the First Amendment continues to effect profound change is likely ignorant to the battle for their upbringing: children.
This paper will present the key aspects of the struggle for brand loyalties of American youth, focusing on the industry of food marketing.
Therefore, the restrictions were not legal.
The distinguishing characteristics of children in the context of advertising are immaturity and inexperience. On the cognitive level, children begin noticing television by the age of six months but do not understand it to be more than colors, sounds, action. As a child grows, he will decipher characters but young children do not yet understand the concept of a narrative. As such, they have trouble understanding a story longer than one or two minutes long,23 though this stage of cognitive development may make following a television program plot difficult, most advertisements fall within the range of attention.
New media and growing Internet use by younger audiences provides advertisers additional opportunity to sell to future consumers.36 One example of such an opportunity is the advergame. Advergames are youth-oriented games created by companies to introduce children to brands under the guise of an interactive, web-based puzzle, arcade-like game37 and/or customizable avatar.38 Researchers from the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale University observed that not only are children increasingly accessing advergames – they are 77% more likely to visit pages with advergames than other sites – they also spend 88% more time on advergame sites than other webpages.
If they are defenseless against incoming messages, what developmental effects does this free flow of commercial information44 have on America’s children? Most of the research to address this question has focused on the content of television, as until recently it was the most prominent and dominant media engaging children.45 As demonstrated by both the Central Hudson Test and Lorillard Tobacco, the preference of governmental speech regulation is to abstain when possible, for, “if the First Amendment means anything, it means that regulating speech must be a last – not first – resort.” 46 Even so, research prove that children identify with favorite television characters through a phenomenon called wishful identification,47 one of many implicit psychologic techniques used in advertising to engage and persuade audiences.48 Across all audiences, viewers of may desire to be like characters they like or perceive to have a personality or perspective similar to them.
Additionally, organizations like the Children’s Advertising Review Unit (CARU), established by the National Advertising Review Council60 is intended to keep an eye on the industry in the interest of children’s protection. CARU seeks to review and evaluate advertising directed at children and ensure advertisers are compliant with CARU’s Self-Regulatory Guidelines for Children’s Advertising. If a campaign is misleading, inaccurate or unaligned with these guidelines, a remedy is sought though voluntary change by the offending advertiser, then deferred to the FTC or FCC for federal review if necessary.
Today one-third of children in the United States are overweight or obese and rates of diet-related diseases in youth are at all time high.71 More adults are obese than children, and more obese than they were in their youth and teenage years. Though this point is outside the focus of the present report, it is worthwhile to explore the food marketing environment for this demographic to determine if it played a role in the consumption habits of today’s adults. Such a study may provide information about whether the self-regulation of the past fifty years, since the implementation of Virginia, has played any role.
Like most efforts addressed in this paper, Admongo is a small, potentially fleeting step in the direction of good intention. Following the lead of Virginia, should the government continue to seek regulation of food marketing to children, it must encourage a free flow of balanced information into the marketplace of ideas. This may mean focusing governmental efforts on supporting existent healthy marketing campaigns instead of regulating the unhealthy ones.
Estate: Law of Mass Media, p. 1128, (11th ed. 2010).
2 Id. at p. 35-19.
3 National Institute of Health, 1969 Conference on Food, Nutrition, and Health: Section 4, Final Report (1969), http://www.nns.nih.gov/1969/full_report/White_House_Report2_S4.pdf.
4 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Guidelines for school health programs to promote lifelong healthy eating, MMWR (Jun 14, 1996), http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/pdf/rr/rr4509.pdf.5 Brian L. Wilcox, Dale Kunkel, Joanne Cantor, Peter Dowrick, Susan Linn, &Edward Palmer, Report of the APA Task Force on Advertising and Children. http://www.apa.org/pubs/info/reports/advertising-children.aspx.
7 Marc E. Babej, U.S. Ad Spending Grows Fifth Quarter in a Row… But Pace of Growth is Slowing, Forbes (Jun. 16,2011), http://www.forbes.com/sites/marcbabej/2011/06/13/u-s-ad-spending-grow-fifth-quarter-in-a-row-but-pace-ofgrowth-is-slowing/.
8 Aviva Lucas Gutnick, Michael Robb, Lori Takeuchi, Jennifer Kotler, Always Connected: The New Digital Media Habits of Children (2011), http://www.joanganzcooneycenter.org/upload_kits/jgcc_alwaysconnected.pdf.
9 Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, CCFC, http://www.commercialfreechildhood.org/.10 Carter, et al., supra. See note 1 at pp. 601.
11 Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, Inc., 425 U.S. 748 (1976).
65 L. Ed. 2d 341 (1980).
13 Carter, et al., supra. See note 1 at pp. 607-622.
15 Martin Redish, Childhood Obesity, Advertising and the First Amendment (Jun. 8, 2011), http://www.gmaonline.org/file-manager/Health_Nutrition/childhood_advertising__firstamendment.pdf.
16 The White House Childhood Obesity Task Force, Childhood Obesity Task Force Unveils Action Plan: Solving the Problem of Childhood Obesity Within a Generation, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/childhood-obesitytask-force-unveils-action-plan-solving-problem-childhood-obesity-.
17 CDCP, supra. See note 3.
18 Redish, supra. See note 11 at page 20.
19 Lorillard Tobacco Company v. Reilly, 533 U.S. 525, 121 S.Ct. 2404, 150 L.Ed.2d 532 (2001).
20 Id.21 James W. Potter, Media Literacy, p. 63, (5th ed. 2010).
22 Federal Trade Commission, FTC Policy on Deception (Oct. 14, 1983), http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/policystmt/addecept.htm.
23 Potter, supra. See note 20.
29 Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Assn., 131 S. Ct. 2729, 2733 (2011).
30 Id.31 Brown, supra. See note 28.
33 Graham v. Florida, 130 S. Ct. 2011, 176 L. Ed. 2d 825 (2010).
38 Moore, supra. See note 30 at p. 15.39 Park, supra. See note 33.
40 Id. (Healthy advergame was sponsored by Dole, promoting fruits).
42 Alice Park, Why Cartoon Characters Make Kids’ Food Taste Better, TIME (Mar. 8, 2011), http://healthland.time.com/2011/03/08/why-cartoon-characters-make-kids-food-taste-better/.
43 Consumers Union Report, supra at Product Placement, http://www.consumersunion.org/other/sellingkids/productplacement.htm.
International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity (Feb. 10, 2004), http://www.ijbnpa.org/content/1/1/3#.
46 Thompson v. Western States Medical Center, 535 U.S. 357, 373 (2002).
47 Cynthia Hoffner. Children’s Wishful Identification and Parasocial Interaction with Favorite Television Characters, Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media (1996).
49 Hoffner, supra. See note 42 at p. 1.
50 Moore, supra. See note 25.51 Federal Trade Commission, Marketing Food To Children and Adolescents: A Review of Industry Expenditures, Activities, and Self-Regulation: A Federal Trade Commission Report To Congress (July 2008), http://www.ftc.gov/os/2008/07/P064504foodmktingreport.pdf.
52 Prevention Institute, Restricting Television Advertising to Children, Nutrition Policy Profiles (May 2002), http://www.preventioninstitute.org/CHI_food_advertising.html.
53 Corinna Hawkes, Marketing Food to Children: The Global Regulatory Environment, World Health Organization (2007).http://www.who.int/dietphysicalactivity/regulatory_environment_CHawkes07.pdf.
54 Center for Science in the Public Interest, Food Marketing in Other Countries (Feb. 16, 2007), http://www.cspinet.org/nutritionpolicy/foodmarketing_abroad.pdf.
55 FTC, supra. See note 15 at page 1.
56 Story, supra. See note 34.
57 Carter, et al., supra. See note 1 at p. 675.58 Montgomery, supra. See note 26.
60 Children’s Advertising Review Unit, About Us (2008) http://www.caru.org/about/index.aspx.
61 CARU, supra. See note 47.
62 Angela Campbell, Self-Regulation and the Media (Jun. 16, 1999), http://www.law.indiana.edu/fclj/pubs/v51/no3/CAMMAC15.PDF.63 Children’s Advertising Regulation Unit, Supporters (2008), http://www.caru.org/support/supporters.aspx.
64 IBISWorld Report supra. See note 23.
65 Montgomery, supra. See note 26.
66 Better Business Bureau, About the Initiative (2012), http://www.bbb.org/us/about-the-initiative/.
67 CCFC, supra. See note 8.
68 National Institute of Health, National Nutrition Summit 2000, Background Brief, http://www.nns.nih.gov/2000/background/background_brief/brief.htm.
69 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: U.S. Obesity Trends (Jul. 10, 2011), http://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/trends.html. (Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia reached 30% or greater obesity prevalence).
70 Id.71 Harris, supra. See note 37 at page 14.
72 Virginia, 425 U.S. at 748.
73 Carter, et al., supra. See note 1 at p. 609.
74 Emily Bazelon, Why Facebook is After Your Kids, The New York Times (Oct. 12, 2011), http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/16/magazine/why-facebook-is-after-your-kids.html.75 Nancy Watzman, Food and media companies lobby to weaken guidelines on marketing food to children, Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group (Dec. 5, 2011), http://reporting.sunlightfoundation.com/2011/Food_and_media_companies_lobby/#comments.
76 The Economist, Kid gloves, The Economist (Jan. 4, 2011), http://www.economist.com/node/464997.
78 Ofcom, Ofcom statement on reduction of children’s programmes (Mar. 18, 2008), http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/broadcasting/tv/children-itv/.
79 The Economist, supra. See note 62.80 Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, COPPA, http://www.coppa.org/coppa.htm.
require and use personal data).
82 FTC supra. See note 1.
84 Virginia, 425 U.S. at 748.
85 Redish, supra. See note 11.
88 Redish, supra. See note 11 at page 20.
89 Federal Trade Commission, Admongo.gov, http://www.admongo.gov.
91 CommonSense Media, Admongo (2012), http://www.commonsensemedia.org/website-reviews/admongo.
Babej, Marc, E. U.S. Ad Spending Grows Fifth Quarter in a Row… But Pace of Growth is Slowing, Forbes (Jun. 16, 2011). Accessed 19 Apr. 2012. <http://www.forbes.com/sites/marcbabej/2011/06/13/u-s-ad-spending-grow-fifth-quarter-in-a-row-but-pace-of-growthis-slowing/&gt;.
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Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Assn., 131 S. Ct. 2729, 180 L. Ed. 2d 708, 2011 ILRC 2071, 32 ILRD 137 (2011).
Campbell, Angela. Self-Regulation and the Media (Jun. 16, 1999), Accessed 22 Apr. 2012. <http://www.law.indiana.edu/fclj/pubs/v51/no3/CAMMAC15.PDF&gt;.
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Federal Trade Commission. FTC Policy on Deception (Oct. 14, 1983). Accessed 20 Apr. 2012. <http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/policystmt/ad-decept.htm&gt;.
Federal Trade Commission. Marketing Food To Children and Adolescents: A Review of Industry Expenditures, Activities, and Self-Regulation: A Federal Trade Commission Report To Congress (July 2008), Accessed 23 Apr. 2012. <http://www.ftc.gov/os/2008/07/P064504foodmktingreport.pdf&gt;.
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Graham v. Florida, 130 S. Ct. 2011, 176 L. Ed. 2d 825 (2010).
Gutnick, Aviva Lucas, Robb, Michael, Takeuchi, Lori and Kotler, Jennifer. Always Connected: The New Digital Media Habits of Children (2011). Accessed 23 Apr. 2012. .
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Hoffner, Cynthia. Children’s Wishful Identification and Parasocial Interaction with Favorite Television Characters, Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media (1996).
IBISWorld, Inc. The Changing Landscape of Advertising in Media, Special Report (Feb, 2010).
Lorillard Tobacco Company v. Reilly, 533 U.S. 525, 121 S.Ct. 2404, 150 L.Ed.2d 532 (2001).
Martin Redish. Childhood Obesity, Advertising and the First Amendment (Jun. 8, 2011). Accessed 23 Apr. 2012. <http://www.gmaonline.org/file-manager/Health_Nutrition/childhood_advertising__firstamendment.pdf&gt;.
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Thompson v. Western States Medical Center, 535 U.S. 357, 373 (2002).
Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, Inc., 425 U.S. 748 (1976).
Watzman, Nancy. Food and media companies lobby to weaken guidelines on marketing food to children, Sunlight Foundation Reporting Group (Dec. 5, 2011). Accessed 23 Apr. 2012. <http://reporting.sunlightfoundation.com/2011/Food_and_media_companies_lobby/#comments&gt;.
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