Chapter 7: Children's Understanding of Toy Ads

This chapter is split into two distinct sections – ‘oral responses’ and ‘artistic interpretation’ – focussing on the fieldwork conducted with a group of 7- to 11-year-old children in a small rural primary school in West Wales. This chapter looks specifically at the ways in which the children negotiated meaning in and understanding of the toy advertisement sample, considering how they, as the main target audience or ‘receivers’, perceived the advertisements in terms of technical production features and gender (cf. Research Issue 5).

Ten televised toy advertisements were edited onto a video, selected in terms of target audience and shot duration and designed to simulate a ‘typical’ commercial break between children’s programmes on a Saturday morning during the Christmas period. A simple questionnaire was formulated to enable the children to make notes on the five key issues of target audience, level of excitement, speed of movement, music and voiceovers. The children were asked to watch the video and complete the questionnaires before participating in semi-structured discussion about the advertisements. The children’s conversations were recorded, transcribed and then analysed.

To counterbalance a reliance on oral communication skills (especially given the bilingual character of the school), finding an alternative means of investigation was considered vital. Art seemed to be the most effective way to move from the ‘spoken’ to the ‘unspoken’. The children were challenged to design their own toy advertisements. To maintain the focus of the investigation, the advertisement designs were evaluated in terms of how well the children comprehended and manipulated conventional technical production features, and how they targeted their drawings at a given (gendered) audience sector. Where possible, parallels were also drawn between the children’s designs and actual television advertisements.

So far, this investigation has addressed two out of the three components within the Text-Producer-Receiver paradigm. Close scrutiny of the micro details within the ‘texts’ was achieved by completing content and semiotic analyses in order to formalise the structural composition and the various connotations in toy advertisements (Chapters Four & Five). The various aims and techniques of the ‘producer’ have also been considered through interviews with industry professionals and a study of typical marketing strategies (Chapter Six). Hence, logical progression leads us to a consideration of how the texts are actually perceived by the ‘receiver’ or the intended target audience.

This chapter will be divided into two distinct yet interrelated sections, recounting two fieldwork exercises conducted with the 7- to 11-year-old children in my sample primary school during the three-year course of this investigation, considering how they – as ‘receivers’ – made sense of toy advertisement texts. Details about the school and the sorts of exercises conducted with the children are given in Appendix A.

The main aim of this chapter is to present a series of observations about how the children responded to the use of technical production features and gender in the toy advertisements. The first section will recount some of the children’s oral responses about a sample of televised toy advertisements. The second section will focus on their own ‘artistic interpretations’ when they were given the opportunity to design their own toy advertisements on paper. Their responses will be detailed using selected extracts from their discussions and some examples of their designs, with the intention of formulating some conclusive statements about how the children made sense of the texts. This will then, in turn, be followed by some brief observations about the success (or otherwise) of the research methodologies employed, together with comment on how the children perceived the whole ‘investigative process’.

In a major workshop session, the children were shown a video of some selected toy advertisements (extracted from the larger sample of 117 ads). The aim of the workshop was to gauge the children’s responses to the advertisements and to encourage them to discuss how the products were presented on screen (formal production features) and the ways they were being ‘positioned’ or addressed by the advertisers as either ‘boys’ or ‘girls’ (gender).

Ten toy advertisements were edited onto video to simulate what a child typically encounters during a three-minute commercial break on a Saturday morning just before Christmas. The advertisements were chosen according to the target audience (‘boys’, ‘girls’ or ‘mixed’) as categorised in the content analysis by the adult coders. Three advertisements were chosen from each audience category, one each of the longest, shortest and average duration. The compilation was therefore deemed representational of the toy advertisement sample as a whole. A ‘lead advertisement’ was also placed at the beginning of the tape, chosen from the mixed audience category and of average duration, intended to provide the children with a ‘yard-stick’ against which to judge the other advertisements. Descriptions of these advertisements are provided in Appendix G.1 (1-10).

The advertisements appeared on the video in the order shown in the following table, which also includes a summary of the ways in which the adults coded the texts in terms of most likely target audience (‘B’ for boys, ‘G’ for girls and ‘M’ for mixed):

Toy Advertisement	Target
Jumpin’ Ship	M
Pro-Action Football	B
Jonny Quest	B
Fairy Magic	G
Barbie’s Dream House	G
Wiggly Worms	M
Dr. Dreadful	M
Gooey Louie	M
Matchbox Car Wash	B
Sindy’s Party House	G

Following Ausubel’s ‘organiser’ technique (in Anderson & Ausubel, 1965: 111), where material is introduced in advance to give individuals a general overview of something more detailed, helping them to focus on the details more effectively and give them a positive psychological boost, I also compiled a simple questionnaire for the children. This questionnaire addressed five key issues: the target audience, the level of excitement, the speed of movement, and the music and voiceover types. The children were simply required to express the strength of their attitudes on a scale. For example: ‘was the music very good, good or not very good?’ Each questionnaire comprised one full A4 page for each advertisement and a sample of the format is included in Appendix G.2. The questionnaire session was followed by a group discussion loosely structured around the question of what was being advertised, what happened in the advertisement, what the children liked best about the advertisement and whether they would purchase the product.

To ensure the least amount of disruption to the school, the exercise was conducted in the staff room. The 7- to 11-years-olds were divided into four groups. Each group was mixed-sex, comprising between six and eight children of the same age and/or school year. The children were divided as summarised below:

The interviewer ensured that the questionnaire was clear before playing the video. The advertisements were considered in detail during a second viewing and the tape was paused frequently. On a few occasions, the children asked if they could see the advertisements for a third time in order to attend to the features they had missed. Although the first detailed viewing of the advertisements produced only responses to some of the technical features, repeated viewing was not considered problematic or invalid. Indeed, repetition is characteristic of toy advertising and it is arguable that most children would become very familiar with the content and sales messages during a typical Saturday morning viewing session.

One of the most interesting observations was that every child identified the so-called target audience after seeing the advertisements only once. It is arguable that there was something in the nature of the advertisement and/or the product to quickly inform the children about the target audience, based on the subtle patterns identified in the content and semiotic analyses. It is also arguable that the gender stereotyped advertising methods, as discussed previously, contributed to this ease of recognition by making the representations appear ‘natural’. In this sense, the advertisers seem effortlessly able to ‘appeal’ to the most likely product users.

A total of twenty-eight seven- to eleven-year-old children participated in this workshop. Even though the children coped well with the written nature of the questionnaire, their responses tended to be restricted and consequently did not reveal a great deal about their own attitudes. Indeed, the children sometimes had to modify their views in accordance with the attitude scales provided, giving ‘inaccurate’ responses as a result. The questionnaire responses have therefore been omitted from this report in favour of concentrating on the more illuminating discussion sessions. The questionnaire should simply be treated as an effective ‘warm-up’ for the children to introduce them to some of the formal aspects of the toy advertisements and to help focus the discussions.

The children’s responses were tape-recorded for later analysis, accompanied by brief hand-written notes. The conversations were then transcribed immediately after the workshop session using the conventions suggested by Buckingham (1993a: x) (Appendix A). These conventions were chosen over other transcription methods because they marked sufficient detail without making the transcripts over-complicated. Most of the recorded conversation was fairly audible and could be easily transcribed. Where problems of poor quality recording prevented detailed transcription, the hand-written notes were used to give an essence of the conversation, echoing some of the words used by the children.

While the children’s conversations (inevitably) included discussion of many different issues (cf. Agar, 1996: 53), this chapter will only be concerned with their responses to technical features and gender issues. In this way, the chapter will aim to address Research Issue 5 and tie in with the findings from the formal (textual) analyses. A full account of this workshop, discussing all the issues raised by the children, together with various extracts of transcribed data and speculative commentary, can be found in Appendix G.3, which is included for use as a general reference only and to give an idea of how the workshops operated.

Of all the production and post-production features identified in the content analysis, the children commented most frequently on the audio features. This was partly because they were prompted to do so in the questionnaire and partly because they reacted spontaneously to them when viewing the advertisements (cf. Davies, 1989: 186; Winick et al., 1973: 37; Macklin, in Hecker & Stewart, 1988: 225). Some music was said to ‘add to the atmosphere’ (Jamie, age 11) of the advertisement, such as the electric guitar rock music and the crowd-noise sound effects in Pro-Action Football. The main debate, however, focused on the so-called ‘suitability’ of the music used in the advertisements, to ‘go with’ both the products being advertised and the intended target audience. The children talked about the music used in the Matchbox Car Wash advertisement, for example, as some of them were familiar with the original version of the ‘groovy song’ (Caroline, age 9) and felt that it really suited the product (Appendix G.3.1.1).

Whilst the Car Wash music met with approval, a discussion about the music used in the advertisement for Fairy Magic sparked an extremely interesting debate about whether or not it was ‘suitable’ for the product. Two of the girls in the sample were particularly critical about the soundtrack as they debated whether the young female target audience would understand or appreciate the rather ‘grown-up’ disco music (Appendix G.3.1.2).

Donna (age 9) defined the music as ‘disco’ and the other children in the group agreed with her, but Christina (age 10) evidently had problems with the ‘disco’ tag and did not ‘understand’ why the advertisers would have chosen the soundtrack. She gradually explained that ‘it was like disco music and little children don’t really understand’, implying that the target age for the product was an important consideration in the selection of audio features and that it was pointless to select music that caused confusion. There was a further suggestion that Christina saw herself as distinct from ‘little children’, perceiving herself as mature enough to know that disco music was for adults (like her). Indeed, as her argument progressed she defined disco as ‘more for older people, but without the fairy in it’.

The music debate continued when the group discussed the advertisement for Barbie’s Dream House (Appendix G.3.1.3). As a music-type, the Barbie jingle was regarded as being very distinctive and ‘appropriate’. Interestingly, Christina (age 10) suggested that young girls would be able to recognise a Barbie advertisement by listening to the music even if they were not actually attending to the television screen (cf. Rolandelli, 1989, in Gunter & McAleer, 1997: 139). By relating her own experiences within the home environment, she explained that ‘if I heard that music, I would NOT go and sit down and watch the TV, but if my little sister heard that music, she would run in and go [silly voice] Barbie, Barbie!’ Once again, the ‘them’ and ‘us’ distinction was made.

Another important consideration seemed to be whether or not the children could dance to the music, and the researcher noted that many of them would spontaneously jig about if they liked the music used in an advertisement. During a lively discussion about Sindy’s Party House, one group discussed the merits of the soundtrack (Appendix G.3.1.4).

One of the first points of interest was the fact that Rachel (age 8) knew the title of the soundtrack song, Saturday Night, even though this was not mentioned in the advertisement. The universal approval of the music as ‘good’ and ‘fast’ stemmed from the fact that it was familiar and had been at Number One in the British pop chart less than one year before this workshop. It is arguable that the advertisers chose a well-known song in order to improve the chances of capturing the attention of young television viewers. The song itself can be described as ‘bubble-gum pop’ in that the tune was catchy and simply constructed. By far the most distinctive aspect, however, was the easily imitated dance-routine that most of the children seemed to remember. Indeed, the researcher recalled seeing many of the children performing the routine at a school Christmas party and noted that they derived much pleasure from this collective experience. The notions of collectivity and assumed-knowledge are considered to be powerful forces within the peer group context (cf. Del Vecchio, 1997: 115 ff.; Corsaro, 1997: 95).

Whilst the girls in the group continued to enthuse about the music in the Sindy advertisement, Andrew (age 9) emphatically stated ‘I ONLY like the music’. In this way, he was distancing himself from a ‘female’ product by stressing that the music was the ‘only’ feature he liked, implying that he would not wish to own the product. Interestingly, this ability to distinguish between the advertisement and the product differed from findings reported in Davies (1989: 187), where it was noted that children often failed to separate the two elements and judged them as one unit. Given the perceived importance of gender differentiation and single-sex interaction in young children (Maccoby & Jacklin, 1987, in McGurk, 1992: 35), however, it is arguable that this was Andrew’s main preoccupation rather than consciously thinking of separating components within the text. Trevor (age 9) seemed to agree with Andrew’s sentiment and he was the first child to verbalise the importance of the dance-routine by explaining ‘I like the music / ’cos I know the / moves for the song’. Trevor seemed to consider himself ‘cool’, wanting to impress his friends, because he began to behave in a suave manner, raising his eye-brow, changing the tone of his voice and looking to the girls in the group when stressing ‘I KNOW the dance routine!’

While music dominated the discussion of post-production features, reference was made to specific production features. During a viewing of the Pro-Action Football advertisement one of the girls expressed, unprompted, her appreciation of slow motion filming when a goal was shown in ‘action-replay’ (Appendix G.3.1.7). The composition of the Pro-Action Football advertisement also prompted Carl (age 11) to identify the technique of cutting interspersed shots of the product with footage from an actual match to construct a dramatic sequence. He explained the technique in a concise way, demonstrating clear understanding: ‘They’ve joined bits of a real match to it, and it shows how the toys kick the ball just like the men’. Carl was impressed by the effect in terms of connoting product ‘realism’.

A final technical feature was noted by one of the older boys in the group. Jamie (age 11) commented on the logo used in the advertisement for the Matchbox Car Wash (Appendix G.3.1.8). In many ways, he analysed the ‘codes’ of the logo in the same way that a semiotician analyses a (media) text because he considered what was signified by the image and how such connotations represented the product. As the following extract illustrates (7.2.2.1), Jamie was initially unaware of the formal term for the ‘bit’ (1) that he pointed to in the corner of the screen. Not knowing the correct term did not, however, deter him from commenting on the effectiveness of the image.

1 Jamie: I think that bit (pointing to the logo in the right-hand corner of the screen)

2 is kind of like a triangle (makes a triangle shape with his fingers) / and it looks

3 good because its like a road and / um / its for Matchbox / Matchbox is always

Jamie used hand signals to ensure that the other group members clearly understood which aspect of the advertisement he was alluding to (2). The Matchbox logo comprised a triangular shape that looked rather like a conventional road sign, containing a stylised image of a road stretching out into the distance. The road theme was further echoed in the dotted white lines stuck though the words ‘Action System’.

Jamie explained that he thought it ‘looks good’ (2-3) because it represented the idea of a road which, in turn, corresponded with the general ‘road’ theme of Matchbox (car) products. In making this connection, Jamie exhibited a sophisticated understanding of the significance of product imagery in terms of the overall marketing strategy since ‘Matchbox is always to do with cars’ (3-2), ‘the road thing’ (4) ‘fits in really well’ (6).

From the way in which many of the children in this workshop were able to critically analyse and show an appreciation of the advertisements in the sample, it is arguable that they clearly understood the subtleties of production and post-production features (cf. Research Issue 5). Since many of the comments the children made were largely unprompted by the interviewer, it is arguable that they were capable of registering the conventions of television and advertising structure within the context of the conventional home-based viewing session.

Gender was the second theme linked to the investigator’s research aims and something that the children were encouraged to focus on when they were asked to consider who would want to play with the toys. The children seemed genuinely interested in the portrayal of gender in the toy advertisements and often discussed what they considered ‘appropriate’ in terms of (gendered) behaviour traits. The children primarily addressed the issue of gender ‘appropriateness’ by discussing what boys and girls ‘really liked’ and all the age groups had distinct ideas about these (gendered) preferences (cf. Goldstein, 1994: 115; Kline, 1993: 195; Hargreaves & Colley, 1986: 123).

A discussion of male character traits was prompted by the advertisement for Jonny Quest (Appendix G.3.2.1). Euros (age 8) dramatically exclaimed ‘Thank God the girls weren’t in it!’ While his words were greeted with hysterical laughter he went on to argue that girls were ‘not brave enough to play that game’, implying that ‘bravery’ was an essential requirement and a ‘male’ trait by association. His suggestion made the girls in the group laugh but they did not seem too concerned about defending themselves or contradicting him.

With only fleeting consideration of specific gender traits, the main gender issues raised by the children were hinged on the conception that boys and girls ‘liked’ different things. When discussing the Jonny Quest advertisement (Appendix G.3.4.1), for example, Christina (age 10) stated that ‘boys like all these action things’. Intriguingly, she restructured this statement by stressing, ‘I’m not saying that girls don’t like it, but most probably the majority of boys and girls //’. Unfortunately, she trailed-off but the implication of her argument seemed to be that it was more ‘usual’ rather than exclusive for boys to like ‘action’ products. It is arguable that the stereotyped notions of male and female ‘likes’ and ‘dislikes’ shaped Christina’s line of reasoning, expressing the same sentiments about the ‘male bias’ of ‘action’ as identified in previous studies (Huston et al., 1984: 708) and so-called gendered television viewing preferences (Lull, 1990).

This tendency of ‘acknowledging the stereotype’ was also seen in the course of other statements made by the children and these suggestions were clearly in line with the way that advertisers perceived and portrayed gendered toy preferences. Caroline (age 9), for example, explained that she liked the Matchbox Car Wash advertisement because ‘I wouldn’t mind playing with cars / but it’s sort of more boys because it’s got the cars’. During the same conversation, Arwyn (age 10) exhibited a more ‘flexible’ view of gendered toy preferences by referring to his own family structure. He explained that his younger brother Idris (age 5) had a similar toy to the Car Wash and that his twin sisters Angharad and Anwen (age 8) ‘play with it sometimes’. The issue of gendered toy preferences tended not to be as ‘static’ for children who have opposite-sex siblings.

The younger girls also appeared to express similar reservations about whether or not they should consider playing with the Car Wash (Appendix G.3.2.2). Menna (age 8), for example, explained that ‘I like it but I think it’s more for boys’. In this respect she juxtaposed her own personal preference with an immediate reference to the social ‘norm’ or ‘accepted’ gender stereotype. The ‘but’ signified that she was placing her own ‘likes’ to one side because they did not correspond or conform to the traditional conception that ‘boys like cars more’.

Just as ‘cars and boys’ were paired together, so too was the notion of ‘football and boys’. The youngest group seemed to imply that the sport belonged in the male domain when they discussed the advertisement for Pro-Action Football (Appendix G.3.2.3). The way in which Chloe (age 7) and Martin (age 7) responded to the interviewer’s questions was often based on personal preference and seemed rather instinctive, yet conformed to gender stereotyped perception (7.2.3.1).

6 Martin: Well / foot... / well, it’s boys and football’s sort of for boys / boys

Chloe claimed she liked nothing about the advertisement (2). Then she made a curious dual-statement in that she simply stated ‘Because it’s football, and I don’t like football’ (4). The first half of the sentence carried with it the goes-without-saying implication that football is automatically equated with boys and therefore does not need to be explained. The second half of the sentence seemed to offer a ‘besides which’ reason where Chloe explained her own indifference to the sport. It is arguable that the notion of social ‘norms’ played a part in her thinking. Added to this was the fact that Chloe was a ‘girlie-girl’ so the chances of her liking such a sport were remote. Her argument was followed by Martin’s (stereotyped) perception of gendered preferences. He explained that ‘football’s sort of for boys’ (6) seeming to imply that it was ‘just the way it is’. Similarly, during a discussion about Sindy’s Party House, Sam (age 8) explained that: ‘I like the music but I don’t like the rest … (because) it’s girlie stuff’ (Appendix G.3.1.4). Tagging a product as ‘girlie’ was deemed a sufficient explanation of a ‘natural’ distinction that should ‘go without saying’.

While the children regarded bravery, cars and football as ‘masculine’, they classified the colour pink and ‘preening’ as ‘feminine’. Colour was consistently seen in terms of signifying the target audience, indicating powerful gender connotations. Christina (age 10) attempted to offer a satisfactory definition of the Fairy Magic product (Appendix G.3.2.4) and colour was her main point of reference: ‘it was, I think, a girl’s toy because it was like all these rings and pink things’. She went on to explain why the colour would be totally unsuitable for boys ‘because all the other boys would make fun of them!’ Christina clearly alluded to the social pressure that many boys face in order to conform to the stereotype of ‘masculinity’. She implied that boys would be ostracised by their peers if they aligned themselves with any products or ‘markers’ that were traditionally regarded as ‘female’.

Christina noted that decorative adornments (‘rings’) were feminine, which was also noted by the younger girls (Appendix G.3.2.5). They listed aspects of the advertisement that were, in their opinion, typically ‘girlie’. Angharad noted the ‘earrings and / and necklaces and stuff’, while Rachel added ‘diamonds’ and ‘the colour PINK’. The ‘girlie’ product features were summarised by Menna (age 8) when she described the main appeal as that of ‘jewelleries’, and the girls in the group as a whole were sure that boys would dislike such things. The features mentioned by the girls clearly reflected the classic gender stereotypes and ‘markers’ alluded to by those involved in marketing to children (cf. Acuff, 1997; Del Vecchio, 1997).

The oldest group of children made some interesting comments about the portrayals of masculinity and femininity in the advertisement for Barbie’s Dream House. Michelle (age 11) discussed Barbie’s ‘boyfriend’ Ken. She explained that even though Ken was male he was still very much a girl’s doll and would not appeal to boys. She explained that Ken is generally presented as a clean-cut character who was not averse, in the context of this advertisement, to slicking his hair back and wearing a glittery suit and a pink bow tie!

The children seemed to be drawing further distinctions within gendered contexts suggesting that on-screen characters were able to exhibit varying degrees of masculinity and femininity depending on who would (stereotypically) relate to them, or had been invited to relate to them by the advertisers (i.e. the most likely target audience). Hence, an Action Man figure would be ‘masculinised’ by being aimed at boys while a Ken figure would be ‘feminised’ by being aimed at girls.

One of the main difficulties encountered by any researcher when undertaking fieldwork with young children is establishing an adequate means by which the children can express themselves. The researcher should always seek to ‘unlock’ the minds of young children by providing suitable outlets for the processes of self-expression. Often, working with young children raises many questions about the validity of using the spoken word as the only means of communication since those individuals between the ages of seven- and eleven-years (as in the context of this study) are unlikely to have achieved adequate linguistic competence. Indeed, oral communication requires a degree of ‘performance’ which can pose problems for young children.

During workshop sessions in the school it was noted that a number of the less confident children were not given the opportunity to air their views since the dominant personalities in the classroom often dictated the flow of conversation. Also, it is arguable that some of the children only said what they were able to say and not necessarily what they wanted to say. This was especially true during occasions of code switching between Welsh and English. My intention was therefore to find a means of moving from the ‘spoken’ to the ‘unspoken’. Drawing and painting therefore seemed an obvious way to create numerous possibilities for symbolic representation, as ‘a non-verbal language; a means of communication’ (Koppitz, 1963: 283-4, in Fury et al. 1997: 1154).

Lewis and Greene (1983: 23) advocated the analysis of children’s drawings for two main reasons. They claimed that the results are extremely reliable and that international research has demonstrated how pictures are a most accurate means of child assessment. They also argued that because children tend to enjoy a drawing task and treat it like a game, tests are completed quickly and easily. They stressed that the results of drawing tests are impossible to modify or fake, unlike oral answers to probing questions that often pressurise children into making a ‘good impression’ or provide ‘appropriate’ answers. Lewis and Greene (1983: 29-31) suggested a framework for analysing children’s drawings – see Appendix H.1 (1-3). For the purpose of my own research, I felt that their ‘funnel analysis’ approach of moving ‘from the general to the particular’ would effectively identify the various layers of meaning within a picture-text.

A workshop session was organised for the seven- to eleven-year-old children in the school. Each child was given a sheet of plain white A3-sized paper and a good colour assortment of both wax- and pencil-crayons. The children were grouped at random around tables in exactly the way they would have been during their arts and crafts lessons. The task was worded thus: ‘Design an advert for a toy, for children of your own age. It can either be for a toy already in the shops, a toy you have at home or an imaginary toy.’

Once initial instructions had been given, there was some discussion about the toy advertisements being shown on television at that time (cf. Anderson & Ausubel, 1965: 111). Many of the children recalled the previous workshop session about toy advertisements. The interviewer was eager to ascertain how far their recollections of these toy advertisements influenced their own advertisement designs. However, the children only recalled what they had been asked to concentrate on, such as the types of music or what happened in the advertisement. They were unable to recall anything specific about the advertisements and could remember seeing only the well-known products such as Barbie. The influence of these specific toy advertisements was therefore minimal in the case of this workshop in that the children were more likely to recall certain features as opposed to an advertisement in its entirety (cf. Gunter & McAleer, 1997: 137). The toy advertisement workshop was therefore unlikely to have any greater influence on the children’s designs than the advertisements seen during conventional home-viewing sessions.

A total of twenty-four children participated in the exercise – eleven boys and thirteen girls. The children spent an entire afternoon working on their designs. The researcher circulated in the classroom talking to them about their work and recording some initial observations on paper. The inevitably noisy nature of the exercise meant that tape-recording the children would have been impossible and the researcher felt that making each individual child speak directly into a microphone (in the sense of an ‘on-location’ report or sound-bite) would have been both obtrusive and unnatural.

Since Flannery & Watson (1995) and Chen & Kanter (1996) failed to reveal any significant gender differences in the form and content of children’s drawings, I decided that my own investigation would approach issues from a different angle. I decided it would be more profitable to focus on the two key issues directly applicable to the overall research aims. Firstly, I wanted to consider the extent to which the children comprehended and manipulated the conventional technical and production features used in televised toy advertisements. In other words, how fluently the children transferred onto the static medium of paper images of toys that they would previously have seen animated on the television screen. I also wanted to compare the children’s designs with actual televised advertisements to assess their recall of technical features. Secondly, I wished to consider how the children set about targeting their drawings at specific genders and the way in which gender was portrayed in their drawings, considering whether the children employed gender-stereotyped ideologies in their own notions of how best to market a product.

These concerns will now be addressed in turn, using the children’s designs to illustrate how they were able to utilise certain techniques and demonstrate good understanding in order to produce effective advertisements. In this way, I hoped to gain insight into how the children operated within the role of ‘producer’, rather than remain in their (usual) role of ‘receiver’. Their designs will also be considered within the established theoretical framework of ‘bricolage’, as a way to explain how the children interpret and reinterpret toy advertisement texts. Basic discussion about each advertisement, including the comments that the children made about their own creations and scanned images of the designs, are given in Appendix H.2 (1-24).

The differing conventions used in moving- versus static-media was not considered too great a ‘problem’ in the context of this workshop since the researcher did not intend to observe the ‘expertise’ with which the children lifted moving images onto paper. Instead, subtle ‘clues’ were sought as a means of indicating how the children were able to ‘reinterpret’ televisual conventions for the purpose of static illustration.

A number of the advertisement designs exhibited some interesting insights into the children’s understanding of how the camera lens is used to create particular effects on the television screen. Indeed, camerawork proved to be most intriguing when comparing the total advertisement sample (cf. Content analysis) with the ways that the children demonstrated an understanding of the shot framing and composition. Some of the children, for example, made interesting use of shot sizes and angles in their advertisement designs. The children who employed these techniques did so with the intention of creating a particular ‘feel’ to their products. Children’s ability to reinterpret the ways in which the ‘camera lens’ is conventionally used was similarly observed by Watson & Watson (in Madeja, 1978: 94 ff.) in their study of ‘visual narratives’.

Colin (age 7), in his interpretation of Action Man (Appendix H.2.1), created a main character significantly larger than the second ‘enemy’ figure in the design, to effectively emphasise their roles in the advertisement and the implied status they ‘should’ have for the audience. Since the figure of Action Man was so large one can assume that he was important and should be the focus of attention. The diminished figure of Dr. X, Action Man’s adversary, signals to the viewer that he should not be regarded as important. The relative sizing was also indicative of the ‘power relations’ between the two characters where Action Man is in the stronger position and likely to triumph over his weaker enemy at any moment (cf. Goffman, 1979).

A Beautiful Cat (Appendix H.2.7), designed by Anwen (age 8), provided another interesting example of relative sizing and clues about the use of camera lens if the product were ever shown on television. The cat itself was disproportionately large when compared with its surroundings. A number of the children thought that the cat was actually a kind of life-size outdoor playhouse to be placed in the garden rather than the fluffy toy that Anwen had intended it to be. However, the advertisement did function to focus attention on the product showing it in the ‘foreground’ and in what can be described as a ‘long shot’. Many of the other products appeared to be presented in this way, such as Secret Diary (Appendix H.2.8) and Tamagotchi (Appendix H.2.21-24), with little room remaining on the page to distract attention away from the actual toy.

The implications of ‘the gaze’ (Chandler, 1999) are also applicable in the context of the children’s advertisement designs. The idea of ‘the gaze’, originating in 1970s film theory, can be used to refer to two things. Firstly, the ways in which viewers look at images of people in any visual medium and secondly, the gaze of those depicted in visual texts (ibid.). Chandler also distinguished between the many kinds of ‘gaze’ manipulated across different media. The term ‘direct’ or ‘extra-diegetic’ address best describes ‘the gaze’ in some of the children’s designs where a person (or quasi-human being) looked ‘out of the frame’ as if at the viewer (ibid.).

If one considers the advertisement designs for the products Tooth Fairy (Appendix H.2.6) and Buzz Lightyear (Appendix H.2.4) one can clearly see the full impact of the ‘direct gaze’. The characters look straight at the viewer and seem to hold attention as a result. The impact of the characters is made more powerful through animated speech-bubbles and direct forms of address. Not only do they ‘look’ at the viewer but they also ‘speak’. This technique of ‘character facing viewer’, although usually only seen in news broadcasts, was regularly employed in televised toy advertisements in the closing ‘product still’. The products are usually shown in long shot at a level angle for a couple of seconds often including ‘small-print’ details such as price, the need for batteries or a warning that figures are sold separately. It is likely that the artists in both these cases had imitated the stylistic nature of the toy advertisements they had seen.

More dramatic ‘camera shots’ were also employed by the children and these worked especially well in the static medium. Peter’s (age 7) advertisement design for the Subbuteo football game (Appendix H.2.3), for example, showed the pitch from the dizzy height of an overhead shot, creating a sense of perspective. Interestingly, however, the televised version of the Subbuteo advertisement (cf. Content analysis) also opened with a dramatic overhead shot of the pitch. It is arguable that Peter was thinking about the way that the actual product was being advertised and decided to try and recreate the effect. A sense of height and perspective was also shown in Dewi’s (age 9) Playstation advertisement (Appendix H.2.12). An overhead mid shot of the product was offset by the small key pads used to play the computer games suggesting that the product was somehow elevated or ‘on top of the telly’, as Dewi explained.

While these shot angles seem to have been influenced by the presentational style of television and catalogue advertisements, the Fabulous Mad Pool Game (Appendix H.2.9) stood out as an ‘invented’ product whose designer also elected to use an overhead shot. Rachel (age 8) considered the overhead shot as the best way for the product to be displayed, also reflecting the conventional methods used in television coverage of swimming competitions where races are shown using an overhead shot of the pool so that the viewer can predict a winner. It is arguable that Rachel was trying to recreate the same competitive atmosphere.

Low angle shots were also seen in the advertisement designs. In the Leather Football advertisement (Appendix H.2.13), for example, Andrew (age 10) seemed to take the audience down to a close-up shot of the football. The individually drawn blades of grass then take one’s eye into the distance, creating the illusion of a low ‘worms-eye’ angle. The audience feels part of the action, to be swept along with the ball at any moment. While the children’s use of extreme angles worked well, the majority elected to use level angle shots. The level shot was also seen to be favoured in the actual toy advertisement sample (cf. Content analysis) so it is arguable that this is regarded as the most ‘natural’ way of looking at objects and therefore the most commonly used.

7.3.2.1 Stylistic parallels between the children’s designs and televised advertisements

While there is evidence that the children were able to manipulate and adapt televisual conventions within a static medium, it was also possible to identify certain stylistic parallels between the advertisement designs and how actual products were depicted on television (cf. Wilson & Wilson, in Madeja, 1978: 94 ff.). Within the complete sample of designs, five drawings stood out as the best examples of how the children recalled details from actual advertising campaigns – Power Workshop (Appendix H.2.17), Kickmaster (Appendix H.2.18), Action Man (Appendix H.2.1), Subbuteo (Appendix H.2.3) and Tooth Fairy (Appendix H.2.6). Each of these designs will now be compared and contrasted with the actual advertising campaigns. It is no coincidence that parallels can be drawn between the designs and some of the advertisements that were included in the sample as a whole. It is arguable that the television campaigns were within the children’s recent memory when they rose to the challenge of designing their own advertisements and were reflected in their drawings as a result.

Tom’s design for Power Workshop is a particularly good example of how the children’s designs sometimes reflected the actual campaigns. One of the most notable commonalties is the method used to show the various Power Workshop tools. In the televised advertisement, each of the tools was ‘swirl cut’ into the frame to occupy full screen space. Each tool was focused upon in its own shot and labelled with the appropriate name – drill, sander, lathe and jigsaw. Tom employed a similar convention as a way of showing the tools that came with his product. The individual tool-shots in the televised advertisement were effectively recreated in the design, in that each occupied its own distinctive frame or shot, grounded in colours that contrasted with the overall background colour of the design. Tom also labelled the tools appropriately, in accordance with the television format.

There were two other notable similarities between the different formats. Firstly, the centre of Tom’s design seemed to mirror the product shot seen at the end of the televised advertisement. That is to say, the actual product was focused upon, taking centre stage and drawing the attention of the viewer towards the details. Within the product shot, other product accessories were displayed, such as screwdrivers, and these are also clearly visible in Tom’s design in the bottom left- and right-hand corners. Secondly, Tom’s design included examples of what can be made using the product. It is conventional for advertisements to offer some form of ‘product demonstration’ and, in the case of the televised Workshop advertisement, shots of the tools were followed by examples of the balsa wood models made using them. Tom’s design included two aeroplanes almost identical in shape to that featured in the actual campaign.

While the similarities between the advertisements are obvious, there are also two obvious differences. Firstly, the actual product featured four key tools. Tom, in contrast, decided to market an additional tool – a saw – along with the other four. This addition was translated into the advertising rhetoric he employed, in that he termed his Workshop a 5-in-1 tool. As a self-confessed owner of the product who had first-hand experience of its capabilities, he felt that a saw would be a useful addition to the tool range, and it also served to distinguish his design from the ‘real thing’. Secondly, the use of colour is distinctly different. In the actual campaign, the product was red, but Tom decided to use blue. Since there was a good selection of colours available to him, it seems reasonable to assume that the colour change was conscious and significant. Again, Tom seemed to wish to distinguish his design from the ‘real thing’. Alternatively, it is arguable that he regarded red as a feminine colour and considered blue a traditionally ‘masculine’ shade, a way of marking out the target audience for his product with greater clarity.

Simon’s design for Kickmaster can also be compared with the televised advertisement for the same product. The first obvious parallel is the way in which the characters appear in the two advertisements. They both adopt very similar physical poses in the sense that their arms are extended to hold onto the pull-back mechanism of the product, while their legs are extended in preparation to kick the ball. In addition, the football shirt worn by the young boy in the televised advertisement is very similar to the shirt worn by the player in Simon’s design. Thematically, both advertisements suggest that ownership of the product will mean success for the user. In Simon’s design, Les Ferdinand is shown as good enough to play football in a professional-looking stadium ‘because of and in relation to the product’ (cf. Chapter Six). The young boy in the televised advertisement receives a ‘pat-on-the-back’ from Les Ferdinand, a premiership footballer, to congratulate him on his new soccer skills ‘because of and in relation to the product’. Interestingly, however, Ferdinand is not actually named in the televised advertisement and there is a degree of ‘assumed knowledge’ about who he is, so Simon demonstrated his knowledge of football by referring to him directly in his own design.

While the similarities are apparent, it is once again true to say that there are two observable differences between Simon’s design and the actual advertisement. Firstly, the setting for the action is vastly different in each context. In the televised advertisement, the young boy is shown practising his skills in a conventional-looking garden. This ties in with the main product claim that it makes football practice in confined spaces a viable and safe option, because the pull-back mechanism ensures that glass breakage is kept to a minimum! In Simon’s design, however, he transported the product to the context of a football stadium, complete with rows of seats and sponsorship advertising on billboards. It is arguable that Simon felt that a change of setting would imply greater authenticity and excitement through product use, where a real-match atmosphere was easily recreated and a sense of wish-fulfilment achieved, equating the product with good football skills.

Secondly, Simon opted to make Les Ferdinand the main product-user in his design, emphasised by the bold wording in his drawing. This product-user status contrasts dramatically with the appearance of Ferdinand in the televised advertisement, in which he is portrayed as an inactive product endorser who seems to approve of the product function but is not shown actively using it. Simon wanted to focus on the professional qualities of the product and how using it can improve a person’s soccer skills to professional standard. He also considered that the product would have more ‘oomph’ if demonstrated by a top professional.

Two other advertisement designs were strikingly similar in technical presentation to the ways in which the products appeared on television. The similarities were not as strong as the previous two designs but the effects are similar to the real campaigns.

If one considers the Action Man advertisement, it would seem that Colin has followed a very similar format to the product stills used in the Action Man advertising campaign as a whole. From the main sample, Ninja Action Man offered the best example of the typical closing shot. Despite the obvious differences in the use of colour, there are a number of strong parallels. What becomes apparent across the two designs is that Action Man and Dr. X occupy very similar positions on the ‘screen’, with the former standing to the left and the latter to the right. The scenes are both shown in long shot to afford a complete view of the figures. In both instances, Dr. X stands alone and ‘defenceless’ while Action Man has some kind of weaponry at his disposal, whether it be a Ninja sword or a lethal kicking leg! Finally, the Action Man ‘A/M’ symbol is included in each shot, at the top of the screen and in roughly the same central position. Colin had paid particular attention to the presentational conventions used in the actual advertisement and tried to recreate them in his own design.

The same is also true of the Subbuteo design created by Peter. When placed side-by-side, the overhead shots offer an identical perspective of the product, where the football pitch markings are clearly visible and a sense of height is achieved. The product name is also similarly positioned in the two designs, where Peter prints Subbuteo across the bottom of his drawing and the product logo appears in the bottom right-hand corner of the actual advertisement. The only significant difference between the product representations is that the televised advertisement included the football player figures spread strategically over the pitch, while Peter’s design did not. Peter, however, included a list of football teams across the top of the picture, which was clearly a substitute for drawing actual figures into the design.

A final comparison can be made between an advertisement design and a televised advertisement from the sample, although on this occasion there is no direct ‘product name’ link between the two. Instead, what seems apparent is that Chloe took a traditional concept and recreated it for her own purposes.

The essence of this comparison is to emphasise the conventional way in which Chloe presented her Tooth Fairy character and the way the product manufacturers created a fairy image for Popsy. One of the main notable similarities is the physical appearance of the fairy in each instance, since both characters have long and wavy blond hair, big blue eyes and long eye-lashes, a tiara, sparkling wings and a flowing frock. A less obvious feature but one which is common to both advertising instances is the fact that Popsy and the Tooth Fairy speak in the first-person and acquire ‘personalities’ as a result. In the televised advertisement, Popsy informs the audience that ‘I’m the prettiest fairy’, while Chloe’s Tooth Fairy is animated by a cartoon speech bubble in which she informs the audience ‘I collect teeth’.

These five examples of parallels between the children’s designs and the televised advertisements would seem to suggest that they remembered many commercial features (some more unusual than others) which added to their overall impressions of the ‘best way’ to present a particular type of product to an audience. It is also interesting how these children were able to translate the dynamic conventions of television, particularly in terms of camerawork features, to the static medium of paper whilst still managing to retain something of the original presentational effect.

Since gender and gender differentiation were key concerns throughout this investigation, it was interesting to consider some of the stylistic differences between the advertisements designed by the boys and the girls. While Chen & Kanter (1996) and Flannery & Watson (1995) found few differences in the way boys and girls drew pictures, they noted that other researchers observed gender differences. These differences were based on artistic ability, human figure drawing, subject matter, drawing one sex more often than the other and levels of expressiveness. With these points in mind, a simple compare-and-contrast exercise demonstrates how striking and extreme the gender differences in the children’s drawings sometimes were.

For the purpose of clear illustration a comparison was made between Colin’s depiction of Action Man (Appendix H.2.1) and Chloe’s Tooth Fairy (Appendix H.2.6). These designs were chosen because Colin and Chloe were both seven years of age and were scholastically matched (after similar scores in the recent SATs for seven-year-olds). In addition, they had both designed advertisements that involved figure drawings.

Using Lewis & Greene’s (1983: 29-31) ‘funnel analysis’ technique (Appendix H.1.1-3) for these designs, one would begin by looking at the overall appearance of the pictures and the choice of subject. In this workshop the children were not allowed to chose ‘just anything’ because the ‘subject’ of the exercise was based on designing an advertisement for a toy. However, the choice of subject matter was vastly different. Colin chose to depict an Action Man figure in fighting-pose, displaying a kicking action lethal enough to floor even the toughest of opponents. Chloe, on the other hand, chose to depict a Tooth Fairy whose main purpose in life was to look after little children by collecting their teeth. While Action Man looked somewhat mean with his straight set jaw, the Tooth Fairy looked more amiable and smiley, waving her wand in greeting. From an initial impression these drawings arguably display what would usually be regarded as stereotypical gender traits where the ‘male’ is aggressive and dominant and the ‘female’ is caring and nurturing (cf. Chapter Two).

Both designs seemed to fill an equal amount of space on the page in terms of the height of the figures. Both Colin and Chloe drew their main figures on the left of the page, accounted for by Western patterns of ‘reading’ and ‘writing’ from left to right and the fact that both children were right-handed. Both children also included secondary elements in their designs, which were somehow related to the main figures. Colin chose to include Dr. X, Action Man’s enemy. It is arguable that this drawing illustrated the stereotyped male preoccupation with power-struggle. Chloe chose to include a house, the base of which was almost the same width as the dress of the Tooth Fairy. This created a sense of balance as each element occupied approximately half the page. Since the house was also the same height as the Tooth Fairy, Chloe was assigning it with equal significance as a key element in the myth. Indeed, the Tooth Fairy always collects teeth while children are fast asleep in their own homes. It is also suggestive of another feminine stereotype of domestication and homeliness.

From an initial study of the designs, one would argue that Colin, the token ‘male’, took less care over his drawing than Chloe, the token ‘female’. On closer inspection, however, looking not at the quality of depiction but at the inclusion of details, both children put much effort into their drawings. Colin, for example, included fine details such as Action Man’s famous facial scar, his crew-cut hair, his eye-lashes, his peculiarly moulded fingers and sleeve pockets full of ammunition, as well as Dr. X’s pony-tail and eye-patch. He even made an attempt at colouring Dr. X’s trousers in a camouflage design. Chloe’s design included an equal number of details. The Tooth Fairy was shown with sparkling tiara, wavy blond hair, long eye-lashes and red lips, a fairy wand and wings, a floral bag for the children’s teeth and a little purse full of money. The house also had tiles on the roof, a faint puff of smoke escaping from the chimney, a decorative fanlight over the front door and colourful curtains in every window.

In a sense, comparing these designs prompts classic parallels with the Barbie versus Action Man debate. Both products have been traditionally placed in the ‘female’ and ‘male’ domains respectively and often seem to embody those character preferences and behaviours that are stereotypically classed as being either ‘feminine’ or ‘masculine’. While Action Man is, as his name suggests, a man-of-action who fights for his country and always triumphs over evil, Barbie is more concerned with the way she looks and the domestic bliss of her ‘dream’ home. Colin’s design was also rather ‘unsettling’ by featuring an act of (masculine) violence, while Chloe’s design was more ‘reassuring’ by focussing on (feminine) homeliness and nurturing.

It is clear from comparing these two designs that Colin and Chloe ‘appealed’ to their chosen target audiences in traditional gender stereotyped ways. These ‘appeals’ can be deciphered not only in the superficial appearance of the advertisements, but also in the connotations of the differential product messages. It is arguable that two key elements are operating here, that would account for how the two children constructed their designs. Firstly, it is arguable that they have simply lifted the images and narratives directly from existing televised advertisements, where the gender representations are both traditionally stereotyped and consistently structured/formulaic, as identified in both the content and semiotic analyses previously. Secondly, the children were actually alluding to and colluding with the ways in which they are conventionally positioned as either ‘boy’ or ‘girl’, not just in the world of toy advertisements but also in terms of social constructions and expectations. In other words, the messages and ‘appeals’ in their designs reflected how the children perceived their own lives and gender roles, together with a degree of acceptance that their positions are ‘natural’ and therefore unquestionable.

It is possible to locate and interpret the children’s advertisement designs in the context of bricolage. This term was first coined by the anthropologist Lévi-Strauss, to describe a process by which an individual or ‘bricoleur’ creates improvised structures by utilising pre-existing materials (see Chandler, 1994a). The bricoleur is said to work with signs, to construct new paradigms from the fragmented and somewhat limited possibilities open to him/her within the established system of (culture-specific) codes (ibid.).

Lévi-Strauss’s theory is applicable to this investigation for three reasons. Firstly, cultural theorists use it as a way to describe practices in youth cultures, to which the children in my sample can be said to belong. Secondly, media theorists use it as a way to describe popular mass media texts, of which advertisements are one example. Thirdly, the practice of bricolage can be interpreted in terms of identity construction (cf. Butler, 1990), where gender is one of many considerations (cf. Chandler, 1998a). These three applications of bricolage arguably correspond with the ‘receiver’ and ‘text’ elements of this investigation. Indeed, it seems particularly apt in the context of the advertisement design workshop because Lévi-Strauss (1974: 17, Chandler, 1994a) described ‘artistic creations’ as a kind of ‘dialogue’ with the materials.

The practice of bricolage is interesting in the sense that it is somewhat contradictory. The bricoleur has relative freedom, on the one hand, to use and reuse signs in imaginative ways, but there is also a sense of constraint in terms of how experienced and competent the individual is regarding the selection and use of the available materials (Chandler, 1998a). The issue of competence is particularly significant when the bricoleur is a child with relatively limited experience of the conventions and purposes of (media) sign systems. In the context of this investigation, the researcher was relying on the fact that the children had at least some understanding of the content features and gender constructions utilised in toy advertisement texts in order to be in a position to reinterpret them in their own designs.

It is possible to apply the underlying theories of bricolage to the children’s own toy advertisements by looking for certain frames of reference (listed in Chandler, 1998). For example, one can look for the ‘inclusion of particular (content) elements’. This is clearly evident in the children’s drawings with regards to the reinterpretation of such things as shot angles and sizes, as discussed previously, or conventional advertising rhetoric. One can also look for ‘indirect allusion to others’ (texts, genres, media), such as the conventions employed in the coverage of swimming competitions (Appendix H.2.9), the cartoon series Wacky Races (Appendix H.2.10/16) or the Disney film Toy Story (Appendix H.2.4).

Arguably most significant in an analysis of the designs, however, is the children’s ‘adaptation of borrowings’. This notion of ‘borrowings’ can be broken down into a number of relative elements including addition, deletion, substitution and transposition. In terms of ‘addition’, for example, a new product feature is ‘added’ to the already established brand line in the Action Man design (Appendix H.2.1) – a figure with a lethal ‘kicking leg’, called Crunch. An extra tool was also ‘added’ to the already established Power Workshop product (Appendix H.2.17) to create something new. With regards the notion of ‘deletion’, the Subbuteo design (Appendix H.2.3), unlike the televised equivalent, omitted to include the players on the pitch but ‘substituted’ them with a hand-written list of teams instead. The stadium setting used in the Kickmaster design (Appendix H.2.18) was also ‘substituted’ in the sense that the actual televised advertisement was set in a back garden. Finally, the idea of ‘transposition’ can be seen in the Tooth Fairy design (Appendix H.2.6) where the traditional image of a fairy is clearly taken from children’s literature and other media genres (cartoons, films).

It is also possible to look at the arrangement of each design, including organisation, emphasis and sequencing. In terms of the ‘overall organisation’ of the children’s designs, it is arguable that they each follow the conventions of the televised toy advertisements by presenting the products as they appear in the closing product-still shots. One can also draw further parallels between the designs and the ways that toy products are presented in catalogues. Each product is displayed together with some additional marketing information such as small print disclaimers and product descriptions. This stylistic convention can also account for the ‘emphasis’ within the designs, since the products were consistently placed in the centre of the page and therefore the centre of attention. The concept of ‘sequencing’ was irrelevant in the context of this workshop because the designs showed single stand-alone ‘shots’ only.

One final consideration when looking at the practice of bricolage is that which ‘goes without saying’ or is ‘noticeable by its absence’. The most striking omission, yet an element that is powerfully implicit within each of the designs, is the whole issue of gender targeting. One never sees explicit categorisation of the products as having been designed for either boys or girls. Yet the notion of a given target audience appears to ‘go without saying’ to a point at which both the children and the adults categorised the designs as appealing to one sex more than the other. This supposed acceptance illustrates the so-called production and maintenance of gender norms within a regulated structure of ‘performance’ (Butler, 1990). Similarly, the televised advertisements never make explicit reference to the target audience, but their very constructions prompted strikingly consistent gender categorisations. This is exactly the reason why a micro-analysis of the texts is important, as a means of revealing the underlying structures of meaning that ‘go without saying’ but which rigidly inform the ways in which the texts should be ‘read’ (including such considerations as camerawork and colour codes).

Bricolage can therefore be seen as one way to approach the question of what children actually ‘do’ with media texts. In building an understanding of an advertisement, the children in this sample were clearly able to focus on specific elements that held some form of communicative meaning for them. Within their acknowledgement and understanding of such things as technical production features and gender representations, the children were evidently building consensual readings and gradually layering their own frameworks of interpretation (cf. Research Issue 5). The older the children, the more elaborate their frameworks seemed to be in terms of being able to make sophisticated observations, arguably developed as a direct result of their increasing experience of and confidence with the medium of television and the genre of advertising.

The children’s responses to the key research issues in each of the two workshop sessions can be summarised in point form:

Technical features

· The children noted that audio features such as music and sound effects functioned in a number of ways – to add atmosphere to the advertisement, go with the product and/or target audience and be suitable to dance to.

· The children often made distinctions between the music and the product, stressing that it was possible to like one but not the other.

· Other technical features noted by the children included the use of slow motion, the importance of sequencing and the symbolic values of the product logo.

· The children’s understanding of how and why technical production features are used in toy advertisements was evident in the way that they employed shot sizes and angles in their own designs.

· There were a number of obvious stylistic parallels between the actual television campaigns and the ways in which the children presented their toy products, indicating that they attended to and comprehended the key content features (whether they were consciously aware of doing so or not).

Gender issues

· The children were able to list male and female product preferences by referring to what boys and girls ‘really like’.

· The children identified male character traits and interests as including bravery, cars and football.

· The children identified female character traits and interests as including childishness, the colour pink, and anything decorative.

· The children also noted that there were varying degrees of masculinity and femininity.

· The children were able to acknowledge gender stereotypes whether they agreed with them or not.

· The boys tended to hold more rigidly stereotyped ideas about gender than the girls did, although the children’s views tended to be more flexible if they had opposite-sex siblings.

· There was evidence that the children targeted their advertisement designs at specific gendered audiences (usually their own), often employing gender stereotyped product ‘appeals’.

Having illustrated the ways in which the children’s responses relate to the main research focus, it is possible to make a number of observations. In order to impose a framework on this section of the chapter, my aim will be to reflect on how the children negotiated and interpreted the production features and gender representations in the toy advertisements they viewed. I will then discuss how and why ‘age appropriateness’ was such a strong underlying concern for the children. Finally, I will attempt to evaluate the methodological approaches adopted when working with the children, in terms of classroom politics, the ways that the children perceived both the interviewer and the exercise, and whether or not these methods were successful.

During a number of workshop exercises with the children, there was clear evidence that they understood how and why the majority of production features were used. When discussing the advertisements they were shown on video, the children were not only able to allude to the techniques but were also able to accurately refer to them using industry terminology. For example, Rachel referred to ‘slow motion’ during a viewing of the Pro-Action Football advertisement (Appendix G.3.1.7). It is arguable that these levels of ‘media literacy’ were acquired during family viewing sessions in the home context, with parents offering explanations and clarification of the events unfolding on screen, as well as during peer group discussions about the medium. Indeed, there was a certain level of prestige attached to ‘knowing’ about the technical details of a media text (cf. Buckingham, 1993a). The high levels of knowledge about the aims and purposes of certain camerawork codes were certainly evident in the ways that the children were able to reproduce them to similar effect in their own (static medium) advertisement designs.

Interestingly, discussion always tended to focus on advertisements, or sequences within advertisements that employed more ‘elaborate’ camera codes. This supports previous research in the field which posits that the more ‘salient’ a textual feature, the more attentive children tend to be when viewing (cf. Welch et al., 1984; Wright et al., 1984; Meyer, 1983). Indeed, some of the children (particularly the boys in the sample) were so engaged with the use of camerawork codes that they would suggest ways in which the advertisements could be ‘improved’. They often worked together to build a consensual understanding of what they considered to be happening in the advertisements, suggesting various theories about how the effects were achieved. These theories tended to be based on their understanding of how certain special effects operated (fast-forward, non-sequential pre-recording, computerisation), as well as a repertoire of ‘real life experiments’ using gadgets and props found in the immediate context, such as the contents of their pencil cases.

Finally, many of the children’s interpretations of the technical features were impressively sophisticated. Not only did they evidently understand the ‘surface’ techniques, but also seemed to relish looking beyond the immediately obvious features to reveal some of the more subtle touches. Some of the older girls, for example, were able to identify intra-textual connections based on shapes and colours, seen as recurring themes throughout an advertisement. Sophisticated evaluations were also made about the suitability or otherwise of various music types. However, while the production features certainly proved interesting to the children, their discussions were clear-cut and straightforward when compared with how they dealt with gender, possibly as a result of the limited ways in which the techniques can actually be interpreted. That is to say, a high angle or a slow-motion sequence tend to carry with them only a limited number of connotations, while the whole concept of gender, in contrast, is infinitely more complex and entangled with wider social and ideological perceptions.

The children tended to deal with gender in a number of ways, by considering it in terms of specific advertisement texts as well as in terms of wider society. Their reactions to the whole concept of gender indicated that the established gender patterns should somehow ‘go without saying’, and that the workshops were a little absurd to focus on something so ‘natural’ and ‘taken for granted’. Yet this idea of ‘naturalness’ did not stop the children from using gender as a way to gauge the toy advertisements.

The underlying gender issues in the children’s own advertisement designs were interesting. In essence, the advertisements followed established gender stereotypes (cf. Chapter Two) in terms of such things as product themes and character actions. This tendency was seen clearly when Colin’s Action Man design was compared with Chloe’s Tooth Fairy, previously, where the former connoted ‘violence’ and the latter connoted ‘caring’ – a traditional (gendered) binary opposition, clearly ‘acted out’ or ‘performed’ by the children through their selection and depiction of gendered subjects. The ‘appeals’ used by the children to target certain gendered audiences mirrored the ways in which the actual advertisement producers framed their narratives (cf. Chapters Four & Five). Hence, the children were (inadvertently) accepting and reproducing the ways in which they were being positioned as either ‘boy’ or ‘girl’ in the world of advertising. This indicated that they do not ‘question’ these positionings but rather accept them as ‘natural’, and go along with the so-called ‘performance’ to maintain established gender patterns. Indeed, in a discussion about Sindy, Sam (age 9) seemed almost aghast that the researcher did not already know the importance of distinguishing boys’ and girls’ products and that the differences should somehow ‘go without saying’. Sam used ‘gender’ as a form of reasoning that required no explanation in and of itself (Appendix G.3.1.4):

7.5.2.1 Focus advertisement – Sindy’s Pop Star Party House (Children aged 8-9)

The use of an obvious gender target in the advertisements was frequently perceived negatively. The researcher often found that the older children in the group, particularly the more forceful girls, automatically dismissed the single sex advertisements and were especially passionate in their dismissal of female-targeted products. The children seemed more prepared to view the mixed advertisements objectively, feeling less conscious of peer-group reaction because all judgements were based on common (gender) ground. That is to say, mixed audience advertisements were designed in such a way that they were intended to appeal to boys and girls, therefore legitimising positive reactions from either gender.

However, the ‘likes’ of boys and girls were referred to in stereotypical ways despite some efforts to argue to the contrary. Arwyn (age 10) tended to play with established concepts of masculinity and femininity as a way to shock and amuse his peers (Appendix H.5.2.1). He invented what he considered to be the only rational equivalent to the term ‘tomboy’, by describing ‘feminine boys’ as ‘tomgirls’. It is arguable that to allude to such gendered terminology draws still further attention to the polarity between ‘masculine’ and ‘feminine’ behaviours in the child’s world. In his efforts to formulate a credible alternative term, Arwyn drew attention to the very real contrasts, colluding still further with the reinforcement of gender stereotypes. This idea of perpetual reinforcement can be summarised neatly in that ‘to allude is to collude’. That is to say, referring to gender stereotypes and gender differences acknowledges and reinforces the conventional frameworks and divisions. This makes explicit the ‘illusion’ of gendered ‘performance’ whilst simultaneously partaking in the whole process of ‘performativity’. In this sense, the children were colluding in the enduring presence and power of gender stereotypes as a socially generated and sustained structure of relations or binary oppositions.

Ultimately, one of the key observations during the toy advertisement video workshop was the fact that every child, without exception, was able to classify the target gender for each advertisement at the first viewing, and almost instantaneously in some instances. Even children as young as four-years-old speedily made these categorisations. It is arguable that the ‘gender appropriateness’ of the products being advertised was therefore a major concern to the children and considered important in terms of how the product should be judged or evaluated. Gender seemed to be one of the main ways in which the children ordered their social worlds as either ‘for boys’ or ‘for girls’. What is more, gender targeting seemed to be ‘obvious’ to them as something that they all knew about. It is arguable that social structuring and monitoring contributed to their bank of knowledge about these so-called ‘appropriate’ roles and expectations, creating a situation in which they were actually rather surprised to be talking about it. Gender was not perceived as social pressure but rather more as a ‘fact of life’, illustrating that ‘performance’ may well be something invisible yet pervasive. The children found it a little absurd to be talking about gender, and there was sometimes a sense of forced awkwardness when the interviewer would ask them questions about it. Such discussions did not seem to ‘make sense’ to the children because they did (on the whole) accept how gender was portrayed, arguably also accepting their own position as being either ‘boyed’ or ‘girled’.

Age was clearly an important consideration for the children and they voiced strong opinions about what was deemed ‘appropriate behaviour’ for certain ages. Indeed, it is an accepted convention for advertisers to sell a product to a young child by showing it being enjoyed by a slightly older child (Del Vecchio, 1997: 105 ff.; Clark, 1988: 190). It seems that there is a degree of status and credibility attached to owning a product for an ‘older child’ but not if you are that older child.

The reason that I chose to include a section on the children’s perceptions of ‘age appropriateness’ was the fact that they seemed to consider it more vital than gender. One could argue that the children were far more concerned by and preoccupied with ‘age performativity’ than ‘gender performativity’, in that to be seen as ‘old’ was of greater importance that being seen as either ‘boyed’ or ‘girled’. Gender was regarded as a clear-cut and ‘obvious’ distinction, to the point where the children felt there was little need to talk about it. It seemed ‘detached’ from their concerns, as a vast social issue much larger than the world of toys and childhood, and part of the so-called ‘packaged world’ they face (Shipman, 1972: 28). Age, however, was perceived as an issue or agenda that they could ‘claim’ as their own. It was used as a means to construct their own ‘controllable’ (peer group) frameworks of judgement. The importance of age is frequently seen working with young children. They consistently attach status to appearing ‘old’, where a child will insist that they are ‘five-and-a-half’ or ‘five-and-three-quarters’ rather than just plain ‘five’.

Some of the children rejected the products and/or advertisements if they considered themselves ‘too old’ to appreciate them. A particularly good example of this was noted during a discussion about Jonny Quest (Appendix G.3.6.1):

Trevor’s (age 9) attitude was very negative and he rejected the advertisement as ‘babyish’, emphasising ‘I’m NINE!’, his tone suggesting it should be obvious that someone as ‘old’ as he would never want to play with such a product (cf. Acuff, 1997: 61 ff.). Similar age based reactions were also voiced about Jumpin' Ship, Gooey Louie, Barbie and Sindy. However, these toys were not always dismissed altogether since some of the children were able to appreciate them in the context of age. Jessica (age 11), for example, explained ‘When I was young, I used to really like things like that [Barbie’s Dream House] / but I’m too old / um / they just don’t interest me anymore’.

On a number of occasions, however, the interviewer suspected that some of the girls, especially the seven- and eight-year-olds, were almost trying to make excuses for themselves by arguing that they ‘used to’ play with Barbies but ‘don’t anymore’ (Appendix G.3.6.2). Powerful social/peer-group factors were at work in that the girls did not want to appear childish in front of their classmates. There was a degree of ‘worry’ about what others thought. The notion of social ridicule about playing with toys after a certain age came through strongly in a conversation about Fairy Magic (Appendix G.3.6.3). The attitudes expressed by the older girls were unanimously negative, simply explained in terms of the fact that ‘we like grow out of these things now’, compounded by the playful way in which they satirically rejected the product. Age clearly dictated what was deemed appropriate and inappropriate behaviour, irrespective of gender, in the context of creating an acceptable public persona.

It is often illuminating to reflect on wider issues that consistently have an impact on the data generated during fieldwork scenarios (cf. Agar, 1996). In the context of this chapter, there are four distinct considerations – classroom politics, perceptions of the interviewer, perceptions of the exercise, and effectiveness of chosen methodologies (see Chapter Three, 3.2.2.1.1-4). Each of these considerations will be focused on in turn to offer an overview of issues that were not obvious on the surface of the workshops but which had a significant impact on the nature of the data being collected.

It is inevitable when one selects a group of children from a school environment that there are certain established interrelationships that one needs to be aware of. One of the most notable advantages of ethnographic-style research is that one can become well acquainted with the individual personalities and where they stand in relation to one another. That is to say, one becomes familiar with the friends, the enemies, the unpopular children, the dominant personalities and so on, as well as the way that they each perceive one other and interact together. Over the three-year period it became possible to work instinctively and respond to each child individually.

The group dynamics and the subsequent effect that these had on the course of the conversation were particularly apparent with the oldest group of girls. The interviewer was aware that the girls were extremely good friends and socialised together both in and out of school. They would often forfeit playtime in favour of staying indoors to ‘gossip’. Essentially, their interrelations were intimate in that they frequently shared secrets and talked about ‘boys’. Their closeness was a result of the small-school environment and this relative ‘claustrophobia’ sometimes gave way to arguments and upset. The boys in the sample, in contrast, did not enter into such personal and familiar talk at any point in their discussions and always tended to lean heavily on the advertisement texts when forming their opinions. In this way, one could argue that the children were enacting established gender ‘performances’ in that the girls were most interested in ‘people’ while the boys were most interested in ‘things’ (cf. Chapter Two).

The conversations were not simply dependent on the familiarity and closeness of the group members but were also connected with the way in which the children perceived one another and interacted on a daily basis. Needless to say, some children were not liked all of the time. The ‘history’ of the personalities and usual behaviour patterns of some influenced the way others perceived and treated them. For example, Brian and Nathan (both 7-years-old) had an extremely long history of bad feeling towards one another. Their tensions emerged through the way in which Brian always interrupted and rudely disregarded everything Nathan said by describing it ‘boring’. At one point, Brian even lashed out at Nathan in order to prevent him from speaking. ‘Knowing’ the children facilitated the identification of any potential problems in this kind of situation.

As well as considering the existing classroom politics, there was the added issue of how the children viewed the interviewer in the context of this activity. The children were accustomed to the interviewer visiting the school regularly over a prolonged period of time. At the outset of the investigation, she had been introduced as a ‘friend of the school’ which immediately established a more informal relationship with the children, once-removed from the more authoritative role of a ‘teacher’. Given the style of workshop sessions during this time, the children were familiar with the scenario of discussing some kind of textual source (usually advertisements on video), with their speech being recorded onto tape.

On only two occasions during the course of the study did the children make direct reference to the interviewer and the views across the two different groups were of startling contrast. In the first instance, the younger boys seemed to perceive the interviewer as being extremely young; not much older than them and certainly significantly younger than their parents. The oldest group of girls, in contrast, saw the interviewer in a different light because they considered her old enough to know everything! These differing perceptions were indicative of the fact that the children were frequently ‘confused’ about the role of the interviewer. They knew that she was interested in what they thought about television and advertisements, but she also participated in the general life of the school (particularly arts and crafts). However, the children seemed consistently comfortable about talking to her both formally and informally, facilitated by her regular (twice-weekly) visits to the school throughout the three-year research period.

On a number of occasions during these discussions, the interviewer and the children had to work together to build mutual trust. Many children, for example, made the interviewer promise not to let the teacher hear the tapes. The children seemed to open up and contribute more fully to the discussions once promises were made, having been reassured of their freedom to say exactly what they wished without recrimination.

The children also revealed their attitudes towards the exercise as a whole. The oldest group of girls agreed with Lucy (age 10) when she described their lively, interactive discussions as being ‘just like a board-meeting’. Indeed, once Lucy had made this suggestion, the girls all took on a visible air of sophistication, maturity and business-like efficiency by sitting up straight, crossing their legs, smoothing their hair and acting ‘posh’! The interviewer also suspected that these girls were making an effort to prolong the length of their conversations simply to avoid returning to lessons. The boys even continued to tell the interviewer, long after the workshops, how much they had enjoyed themselves.

The children did not always verbalise their attitudes about the workshop activities, but the ways in which they acted physically were extremely telling. Those who were really interested and motivated to contribute to the discussion tended to sit up straight or lean towards one another to facilitate more focused and involved conversations. Some of the children even danced around the room in excitement. The few who were disinterested in the activities appeared anxious to leave the room and often asked when the exercise would be over. Some slid down in their chairs and ‘switched off’ while others did their best to disrupt the other members of the group.

Two distinctive approaches have been described in this chapter, whereby the children were required to respond to the same issues (production features and gender) in two different ways (orally and using art). Each workshop session had its various advantages and disadvantages, and it is interesting to reflect on these for the sake of ‘informing’ future fieldwork with groups of children in this age range.

The first workshop involved the children responding orally to a video stimulus. The most obvious advantage of this exercise was the enthusiasm and enjoyment expressed by the children. They seemed excited about participating in something so ‘different’ from their usual classroom activities, and perceived watching television as a ‘treat’. In this sense, the out-of-classroom context of the study was extremely effective. The environment in the staff room was significantly quieter and therefore more relaxed which facilitated greater focus on the advertisements. The staff room also held further positive connotations for the children, in that it was where they received their enjoyable one-to-one reading lessons. What is more, the children were accustomed to speaking onto tape as part of their reading programme, so the presence of a tape-recorder during the workshop sessions was quickly forgotten.

The video workshop was also unsuccessful in a number of ways. At a most basic level, poor quality audio recordings often made transcription and evaluation difficult for the researcher. While the recordings in some groups were worse than in others, the interviewer often had to rely on field-notes, which did not always do justice to the ‘quality’ of the children’s discussions. Future workshops with the children that involved audio recording were consequently set up with greater care, and basic sound-checks were conducted beforehand to ensure that the equipment was functioning well.

A second difficulty with the video workshop was the inclusion of a written questionnaire. While the majority of the older children (age 9 and above) were able to cope well with the ‘reading and response’ nature of their handouts, the younger children tended to experience problems. The interviewer ensured that the questionnaires were clearly explained and each of the questions discussed before the video viewing, but the children evidently found it difficult to look from the screen to the written page without ‘loosing their place’ and getting confused. Written exercises were therefore avoided in future activities with the children, and ‘scene setting’ was achieved through semi-structured questioning. In this way, the children who found it difficult to work on paper were not disadvantaged.

A final major consideration in the video workshop was that of group composition. The interviewer felt that the groups were simply too large in number. This meant that the more timid children were almost completely ‘lost’ in the noise and bustle created by their confident and talkative classmates. The interviewer also suspected that some of the younger Welsh-speaking children were unable to easily overcome the linguistic barrier of having to adapt to the dominant use of English. They seemed reluctant to make contributions and were rather self-conscious when they did.

A further dimension was that of mixed-sex group composition. The interviewer observed that there was often a tension between the boys and the girls, where their need to ‘perform’ in front of one another detracted from a focused discussion of the advertisements. This was particularly true of the generally tense interactions between Christina and Simon (e.g. Appendix H.5.6.2.1), and could also be seen in the readiness with which a charming Peter switched his point-of-view to align himself with the girls (e.g. Appendix H.5.8.2.1). As a result of these observations, future sessions with the children were arranged more effectively, in that the groups were small (no more than four children), single sex and linguistically distinct. This simple restructuring had an astonishingly positive impact on their contributions, so any future research with young children will undoubtedly be arranged in this way.

The art workshop also had its advantages and disadvantages. The children certainly enjoyed the task, after overcoming the initial ‘torture’ of having to think about what they would like to depict in their advertisement designs. They were certainly given more than enough time to complete their drawings because the task ran all afternoon, with opportunity to ‘finish off’ the following day. There was also a sense that the children felt far more comfortable with the exercise than they had ever done with the oral discussions because the context was identical to that of their scheduled art lessons and therefore familiar and less intimidating. Indeed, each child was ‘allowed’ to make an individual response by producing their own advertisement, so the whole arrangement was particularly suited to giving the quieter children and the first-language Welsh-speakers a more versatile outlet of expression.

Furthermore, when the children were encouraged to discuss their designs in a later workshop, they seemed more confident about critically evaluating their work. It was as though the sense of being a ‘producer’ rather than a ‘receiver’ of the text had led to a sense of empowerment, and therefore a ‘right’ to engage, judge and comment. The only real disadvantage of this session was that it was difficult to talk to the children as they were in the process of actively ‘producing’ their advertisement texts, because the classroom was noisy and over-crowded. On the whole, however, the approach taken in this workshop was extremely effective, and indicative of the interviewer’s growing experience and knowledge of the children.

The 7- to 11-year-old children focused on in the context of the two workshops described in this chapter was particularly interesting as an age bracket. This group is often described as ‘transitional’, in the sense that they have crossed the threshold of peak toy advertising (age 7) and are described by industry professionals as ‘a challenge’ to advertise to (Del Vecchio, 1997: 113). Children at the age of 7 or 8 are said to ‘push away’ from the markers that distinguish them as children (which include toys) in order to project a more ‘grown up’ outer image (Acuff, 1997: 85). The children in this sample displayed similar tendencies in terms of the way they discussed gender and age ‘appropriateness’. By rejecting their positions as ‘children’, they were trying to distance themselves from all the associated paraphernalia, as seen in their underlying reluctance to talk about the toy advertisements or create their own designs unless the toys were placed in the context of ‘other’ – for ‘young children’. Hence, the perspectives of these so-called ‘receivers’ proved fascinating to the researcher.

After viewing the sample of ten televised toy advertisements once only, the children were able to identify the so-called target audience in each instance. This indicated that the target audience was obvious and important to the children as well as a powerful guide to the suitability of the products for them, helping them to understand and negotiate the advertisements they viewed.

The audio effects were the most frequently discussed technical features. The children often judged the music in terms of whether it was suitable or unsuitable for a given product, taking into account the nature of the product and ‘age’. The quality of the music was also judged in terms of whether it was possible to dance to it. The older children tended to make forceful distinctions between the wants and needs of ‘them’ (young children) and ‘us’ (young adults). These distinctions were often expressed in terms of an intense concern with ‘age appropriateness’ (cf. Del Vecchio, 1997: 105 ff.). However, the children did demonstrate the ability to distinguish between the music and the product, where the music was considered ‘good’ even if the product was viewed negatively.

During the conversations, it became apparent that the children were very particular about what they regarded as ‘gender appropriate behaviour’ and they seemed to have strong views about what boys and girls ‘really like’. Gender tended to be judged in terms of the (stereotyped) traits exhibited by the on-screen characters and the nature of the (stereotyped) products, following the conventional ideas of ‘cars for boys’ and ‘dolls for girls’. Essentially, the children would ‘acknowledge the stereotype’ in accordance with ‘boyed’ and ‘girled’ performatives and make their judgements accordingly, which were often in line with how the advertisers perceived and portrayed gender. The children’s views of gender only seemed to demonstrate a little flexibility if they had opposite-gender siblings, where their ‘real life’ experiences challenged the essence of the advertising messages. The children made further gender distinctions that proved both subtle and sophisticated. They emphasised that it was possible for individuals to exhibit varying degrees of masculinity and femininity.

The advertisement designs were carefully studied and a number of interesting patterns emerged concerning composition. The children were clearly able to reinterpret televisual production conventions for the purpose of static illustration. There was evidence that they knew how to create particular effects through shot framing, composition, sequencing, angles and sizes. There were often many obvious parallels between the presentation of toys in televised advertisements and the way they were depicted in the children’s designs. The target gender for each advertisement and the type of products chosen by the children were very revealing. There were a number of identifiable gender traits when comparing the designs and how the boys and the girls chose to target their products, especially in terms of how visual impact was achieved and the apparent themes used.

While the children exhibited impressively clear understanding of the technical production features, their perception of gender was particularly interesting. During their discussions, gender was consistently perceived as ‘natural’ and ‘taken-for-granted’. The children found it a little bizarre to be encouraged to talk about it, almost as though they had never really thought about it before. Of far greater importance to them was the idea of ‘age appropriateness’ and the need to project an ‘old’ public persona. There seemed to be a greater desire to be ‘old’ than to question too closely their positions as either ‘boys’ or ‘girls’, raising questions as to whether ‘age performativity’ was actually regarded as more significant and important to the children then ‘gender performativity’.

During an evaluation of the two different workshop methodologies, observations were made about four key considerations, each having an effect on the outcome of the sessions. Classroom politics were considered significant in terms of conversational flow, focused on how the children perceived one another and interacted as a group, together with acknowledgement of established behaviour patterns and interrelationships. It was also deemed important to consider the ways that the children perceived both the interviewer and the exercise, while also critically reflecting on the success or otherwise of the research methodologies. The way in which the group of seven- to eleven-year-old ‘receivers’ reacted to and negotiated the advertisement texts was both illuminating and intriguing.

Toy Advertisement

Jumpin’ Ship

Technical features

Gender issues