Have you ever felt defeated, sad or lacked motivation and you see an advertisement that motivated you to get up stop feeling sorry for yourself? That’s what positive advertising can do for you.
On a day to day basis Americans are targeted with thousands of ads that promote unrealistic body images and overconsumption, however there are also a lot of ads that promote realistic body images, safety, inspire people and promote a healthy life style.
Advertisements have helped stop people from dying daily saving lives including yours.
Advertising encourages people to make smart decisions, be healthy, be confident in who we are and motivates us to never give up.
Advertisements make us spend money, ruin our self-esteem like the advertisements below. Advertisements tell you that you’re not good enough and to keep buying causing young adults and kids to be obese and insecure. This is the main thing that most people use as excuses as to why people are overweight and have low self-esteem and spend money recklessly.
well if advertisements are this powerful and can affect people negatively why don’t we talk about the power positives advertising does for people. Advertisements help people make good decisions and healthy life styles choices that help them avoid negative life choices that would adversely affect their life. According to a study done by U.S centers for disease controls and prevention an ad called CDC: Tips From Former Smokers Terrie’s tip Ad motivated 1.6 million smokers to quit smoking and 100,000 plus actually quit for good.
There have also been celebrities like Debi Austin who have talked about the effects of smoking as well.
“Researchers estimated that, by quitting, former smokers added more than a third of a million years of life to the U.S. population.” This is proof that advertisements save lives daily including yours because there are a lot of people who never smoke who die from lung cancer because of second hand smoke. Put the ad in there. One of the main reasons positive advertisements are effective like negative ads is because it affects people emotionally and personally. Look at The Unseen it can wait Ad from at&t the short Ad is about a being distracted while driving. In the video a man sees a little boy in the back seat who says don’t you want to answer that (meaning the phone) The man never with a kid in the car. After this the kid says no its ok I’m not there I’m here. The Ad then shows a kid running after a soccer ball and as the man answers the phone he kills the kid. These types of Ads are what cause people to make smart decisions and results in positive outcomes. These positive commercials are more effective than commercials encouraging drinking or smoking because ant smoking, drinking, texting while driving gives people a glimpse of reality of a situation that will often happen.
Speaking of reality, young adults and children are significantly affected when analyzing their weight and looks advertisements can hurt their confidence and self-esteem.
Advertisements however, can uplift children and young adults resulting in confidence and self-esteem boost.
As you can see these Ads above are negative and can affect young adults and children for years or their whole life. The reality is that there isn’t any Ads that tell kids its ok to be overweight and that’s a good thing, but there are positive Ads for plus size kids to see and it can indirectly motivate and give confidence to them. With the ads above those types of ads are horrible there is a way to talk to kids and increase their confidence and self-esteem in other ways. As you can see below Michelle Obama was in an advertisement with a few NFL sports players to encourage kids to play and be active. Kids are followers and if kids see other kids having fun and participating in physical activities they often may want to participate. Often coaches who see that an overweight kid is playing a sport they will encourage them and get the team to as well giving the plus size kid confidence wanting to stay active and participate in physical activities. Another commercial is the Disney commercial get out and play an hour a day these are the best way to give plus size kids confidence and raise their self-esteem, by supporting them and encouraging them to live healthy. According to eatright.org yelling or punishing your child for eating unhealthy foods can lead them to over eat and cause an eating disorder. Also yelling or punishing them about weight, physical activity or food will just increase their unhealthy habit. On the site its states that “Judging your own body or your child’s can result in lasting detrimental effects to your child’s body image and relationship with food. “
Just like kids’ young adults are sensitive regarding their weight and there are positive commercials that will uplift their self-esteem and confidence take Layne Bryant for example. Layne Bryant’s 2016 commercial shows plus size women displaying their confidence acknowledging that they too can feel sexy, confident and love their body. Other companies are beginning to do this as well target is well known, and they have showcased a model named Denise Bidot and she is displaying her stretch marks in the new target Ad. This is a positive step for people to feel more empowered and confident in how they look. Normally in the past target would put make up on their models and cover things like stretchmarks up, but now they are showcasing it. As a culture we tend to always look at the negatives of advertising, but there are many Advertisements showing plus sized people. This is helping people realize being thin or muscular isn’t the only way someone can feel confident or sexy.
Another misconception about advertising is that commercials that address something directly like weight its automatically negative and I disagree. This commercial below I advise anyone who is a parent or plan on becoming a parent to watch because this commercial is America in a nut shell. Again, positive commercials hit you with reality not a false reality which could affect someone’s life.
The constant reiteration of commercials, over time, can help influence people to work hard stay motivated and as a result, those commercials influence their mind in a positive way making their life better and more fulfilled. Toyota release a super bowl ad called Good Odds this commercial shows a girl who was born with a birth defect where she has one full hand, but her left hand and both of her feet are not there. She participated in the Paralympics or Olympics and began to achieve her dream skiing. This commercial shows that If this woman decided to give up and not stay motivated she wouldn’t be living a better and more fulfilled life. This positive commercial uplifts people to believe in hard work and it will pay off, but it also eliminates excuses for people to use as to why they couldn’t achieve their dream.
Many people believe consumerism is bad because we as people see thousands of ads every year that tell us to buy this and buy that, but these are companies that are trying to make money that’s what they are supposed to do. From what I see consumerism isn’t the problem people are no one is forcing anyone to buy anything. If you see a MC Donald’s commercial or your child does you don’t have to go buy it, you can apply self-discipline to your life and not buy their product. Its that easy, but we live in a world where we blame everyone, but ourselves. The perfect example of consumerism is Nike Ads they are promoting their products, but they are doing it in a way that is Positive. Look at the Colin Kaepernick commercial Dream Crazy. This commercial below is all about telling people whoever you are or where ever you’re from go after your dreams and “you don’t have to be like anybody to be somebody.” This commercial along with others teaches team work, commitment, never giving up these commercials motivate thousands if not millions of people, so again consumerism and the effect of commercials don’t have to be negative they can be positive.
In conclusion advertising saves lives helping people make smart decisions, never give up on their dream and motivates them to achieve their goal, therefore giving them the tools to live a better life. Positive advertising has and will continue to uplift children and young adults’ self-esteem and giving them the confidence to love themselves the way they are. Commercials are not just about getting people to buy their products. It’s about getting them emotionally invested in a commercial, so they not only buy their products or service, but encourage them to make smart decisions as well. Overall advertising is mostly positive and helps everyone even when you think its negative that doesn’t mean there isn’t a positive message behind it.
How Advertising Affects Us in a Positive. (2022, Feb 20). Retrieved from https://paperap.com/how-advertising-affects-us-in-a-positive/