O CH Yearbook 2007 N I L T dren H E front ,M edia edge and CHILdren, C edia and onsum M ConsumPtion P tion The International Clearinghouse ON THE on Children, Youth and Media with the support from UNESCO in producing the yearbook front NORDICOM Nordic Information Centre for Media and Communication Research Göteborg University edge Box 713, SE 405 30 Göteborg, Sweden Telephone: +46 31 786 00 00 Fax: +46 31 786 46 55 & TUFTE BIRGITTE KARIN M. EKSTRÖM EDITORS: www.nordicom.gu.se EDITORS: ISBN 978-91-89471-51-1 KARIN M. EKSTRÖM & BIRGITTE TUFTE The International Clearinghouse ISBN 978-91-89471-51-1 on Children, Youth and Media NORDICOM 9 789189 471511 Göteborg University Yearbook 2007 The International The International Clearinghouse Clearinghouse on Children, Youth and Media, at on Children, Youth and Media A UNESCO INITIATIVE 1997 Nordicom Göteborg University Box 713 SE 405 30 GÖTEBORG, Sweden In 1997, the Nordic Information Centre for Media and Web site: Communication Research (Nordicom), Göteborg www.nordicom.gu.se/clearinghouse University Sweden, began establishment of the International Clearinghouse on Children, Youth and DIRECTOR: Ulla Carlsson Media, financed by the Swedish government and SCIENTIFIC CO-ORDINATOR: UNESCO. The overall point of departure for the Cecilia von Feilitzen Tel:+46 8 608 48 58 Clearinghouse’s efforts with respect to children, youth Fax:+46 8 608 46 40 and media is the UN Convention on the Rights of the E-mail: [email protected] Child. INFORMATION CO-ORDINATOR: The aim of the Clearinghouse is to increase Catharina Bucht awareness and knowledge about children, youth and Tel: +46 31 786 49 53 media, thereby providing a basis for relevant policy- Fax: +46 31 786 46 55 making, contributing to a constructive public debate, E-mail: [email protected] and enhancing children’s and young people’s media literacy and media competence. Moreover, it is hoped that the Clearinghouse’s work will stimulate further THE CLEARINGHOUSE IS LOCATED AT NORDICOM research on children, youth and media. The International Clearinghouse on Children, Youth Nordicom is an organ of co-operation between the Nordic and Media informs various groups of users – countries – Denmark, Finland, researchers, policy-makers, media professionals, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. The voluntary organisations, teachers, students and overriding goal and purpose is to interested individuals – about make the media and communication efforts undertaken in the Nordic countries known, both throughout • research on children, young people and and far beyond our part of the media, with special attention to media world. violence Nordicom uses a variety of chan- nels – newsletters, journals, books, databases – to reach researchers, • research and practices regarding media students, decisionmakers, media education and children’s/young people’s practitioners, journalists, teachers participation in the media and interested members of the general public. Nordicom works to establish and • measures, activities and research strengthen links between the Nordic concerning children’s and young people’s research community and colleagues media environment. in all parts of the world, both by means of unilateral flows and by linking individual researchers, Fundamental to the work of the Clearinghouse is the research groups and institutions. creation of a global network. The Clearinghouse Nordicom also documents media publishes a yearbook and a newsletter. Several trends in the Nordic countries. The bibliographies and a worldwide register of joint Nordic information addresses organisations concerned with children and media have users in Europe and further afield. The production of comparative been compiled. This and other information is available media statistics forms the core of on the Clearinghouse’s web site: this service. www.nordicom.gu.se/clearinghouse Nordicom is funded by the Nordic Council of Ministers. CHILDREN, MEDIA AND CONSUMPTION ON THE FRONT EDGE Yearbook 2007 CHILDRen, MEDia AND ConsumPTion ON TH frontE EDITORS: edge KARIN M. EKSTRÖM & BIRGITTE TUFTE The International Clearinghouse on Children, Youth and Media NORDICOM Göteborg University Yearbook 2007 Children, Media and Consumption On the Front Edge Editors: Karin M. Ekström & Birgitte Tufte © Editorial matters and selections, the editors; articles, individual contributors (with one exception, see page 161) ISSN 1651-6028 ISBN 978-91-89471-51-1 Published by: The International Clearinghouse on Children, Youth and Media Nordicom Göteborg University Box 713 SE 405 30 GÖTEBORG Sweden Cover by: Karin Persson Printed by: Livréna AB, Kungälv, Sweden, 2007 Environmental certification according to ISO 14001 Contents Acknowledgement 7 Ulla Carlsson Foreword 9 Karin M. Ekström & Birgitte Tufte Introduction 11 Media Culture David Buckingham That’s Edutainment. New Media, Marketing and Education in the Home 33 Pål André Aarsand Children’s Consumption of Computer Games 47 Ian Grant Online Privacy – An Issue for Adolescents? 63 Andrew Burn & Sue Cranmer A Glass Half Full? Schools and Young People’s Internet Use in the UK 79 Birgitte Tufte Tweens as Consumers – with Focus on Girls’ and Boys’ Internet Use 93 Anne Martensen Mobile Phones and Tweens’ Needs, Motivations and Values. Segmentation Based on Means-end Chains 107 Vebjørg Tingstad New Technologies, New Methods? Representing Children in Online and SMS Ethnography 127 Jeanne Prinsloo Youth Media Consumption in South Africa. A Research Overview 143 Brand and Advertising Culture Simona De Iulio & Nicoletta Diasio Fun Food from Ritual to Performance. An Anthropological and Communicational Analysis of Kinder Sorpresa Commercials 161 Kathryn C. Montgomery & Jeff Chester Food Advertising to Children in the New Digital Marketing Ecosystem 179 Agnes Nairn & Christine Griffin “Busted are Cool but Barbie’s a Minger”. The Role of Advertising and Brands in the Everyday Lives of Junior School Children 195 Ma Teresa Francés Barceló From “Buy me Something” to “I Want This” 211 Lars Pynt Andersen Why Don’t They just Show the Product? Tweens’ Reception and Conception of TV-advertising 221 David Marshall, Stephen Kline & Stephanie O’Donohoe Television Promotion of Children’s Snacks. Food for Thought? 235 Sabrina M. Neeley Children’s Nutritional Understanding. Levels of Knowledge and Sources of Influence 259 Brian Young Celebrity Endorsement. Theory and Experiments with Children 273 Family Culture Jan Phillips Accomplishing Family through Toy Consumption 287 Anna Sparrman Up the Walls! Children’s Talk about Visuality in Their Own Rooms 301 Alice Grønhøj Green Girls and Bored Boys? Adolescents’ Environmental Consumer Socialization 319 Karin M. Ekström Participating in the Catwalk of Consumption 335 The Authors 349 Acknowledgement The publication of this book about children, media and consumption has been possible thanks to the support of The International Clearinghouse on Children, Youth and Media at Nordicom, Göteborg University. We would like to express our sincere thanks to them, and especially we want to thank Ulla Carlsson. Without her patience and support throughout the whole period of editing and publication the book would never have come out. Furthermore we want to thank the contributors to the book for their interesting and relevant chapters and for meeting their deadlines in time. Finally we want to thank Majken Lerche Møller, research assistant at the Center for Marketing Communication, Copenhagen Business School. She has read all the manuscripts carefully and been the anchor woman and central connection between the authors, the undersigned and Ulla Carlsson, Nordicom. The Editors 7 Foreword Children’s and adolescents’ importance as actors on the market has grown suc- cessively the past four to five decades. Young people are of great interest to commercial enterprises of many kinds. These companies are aware of the young people as consumers in their own right, persons with influence on the consump- tion in the family, and not least as future consumers. In order to reach this new target group they use new media as marketing tools. Nowadays, young people are exposed to a steady stream of commercial mes- sages directed specifically to them. Because of its powers of penetration, tele- vision still has a unique position as an advertising medium, but advertising di- rected to youthful viewers is more and more prevalent on the internet and mo- bile phones, as well. Many computer games, cartoons and programmes are a form of advertising in themselves inasmuch as they are the vehicles for ’merchandis- ing’, i.e., the marketing of toys, dolls, clothing, accessories, etc., to youthful viewers. Product trade-marks and logotypes are a nearly universal lingua franca today, a vocabulary shared by young of all classes in a good part of the world. Children and young people of today are consumers at an earlier age than previous generations and they are heavy media users. The rapid pace of change in our societies regarding media technology, information processing, economy and consumption patterns are challenges for children and adolescents, while these changes often seem to be a threat to the older generation. So far, the research often has focused on “traditional” advertising such as TV commercials and has not sufficiently considered that young people are exposed to new types of marketing such as product placement, advertising on the internet and mobile phones, and brands — in the public as well as in the private sphere. The aim of the yearbook 2007 is to shed light on