If we look at the audiovisual ads that are broadcast in any of the media, we can see that the presence of children is very noticeable, we will even see ads in which the figure of the child does not paint anything, a situation that is usually a predominant tonic above all During these last years, what is happening?
Dr. Joaquín Ortiz Tardío, pediatrician of the Hospital de Jerez de la Frontera (Cádiz), indicates that the child figure is introduced for various reasons, interest for children to enter the consumer market as soon as possible, their influence on the family, the consumer action they play in the family unit ... in short, they are potential customers of consumerism. The child figure appears in 27.2% of audiovisual ads and especially those related to supermarkets, media or cultural field. From a study prepared by a group of pediatricians of the hospital mentioned and presented at the 56th congress of the Spanish Association of Pediatrics, it appears that the child figure is interesting to convince other spectator children, since they, in principle, accept the messages as truthful whatever their content or the intentionality they present.
Another fact that has caught our attention is the possible gender discrimination that exists in this issue, since girls are presented as obedient, passive and in the background and boys as brave, bold and intelligent, becoming protagonists.
We do not find it appropriate for the advertising media to use the children's figure in subjects that have no place, but much less that this action is to attract new customers. Behind the audiovisual advertisements where children intervene is a legion of experts who know their work well and who know how to reach the consumer by circumventing some safety barriers. It would be interesting if the relevant commissions were much more exhaustive when it came to gutting an announcement, since apparently, the fact of the presence of children has been overlooked and it has been a group of pediatricians who have discovered this situation.
