No, better advertising isn’t enough to bring about sustainable consumption, but it’s a necessary first step. If the message is not in the public sphere, I believe people tend to view it as “old news” and will stop thinking about it. We have a lot of factors competing for our attention and so if there isn't anything reminding and informing us of issues like sustainable consumption, it’s easy to slip back to our most comfortable position, i.e. one that involves the least change.
However, advertising sustainable consumption, particularly on television, is only going to have a limited effect. It doesn’t help that it’s competing for airspace with adverts that are mostly encouraging us to consume more. More innovative ways of getting the message out there are needed – surely there’s room for more sustainable consumption reality TV shows! Just need a couple of soon-to-retire sports stars, a former Big Brother contestant, the odd glamour girl and an aging news reader going through a mid-life crisis and we’re almost there.
As for the effects of adverts on my consumption behaviour, I’d like to think they have very little impact. I don’t have a tele at the moment, which I guess limits my exposure, but I can’t remember the last time I saw an advert and thought “Ahh, that’s what I need.” I think it impacted me more when I was younger, especially during my teen years where I guess I was trying to find out how to fit in, to define myself. Buying the “right” trainers was an important choice at the time and making “wrong” choices would have led to ridicule. This is one example of the impact of advertising as a whole, which is big – very big. Not just tv adverts, but the whole range of media, e.g. tv shows, sponsored events, magazines, newspapers etc. They have a large hand in creating and defining lifestyle choices - creating and manipulating social norms.
So revisiting the effect of advertising on my consumption behaviour, I’d say that it has a small direct effect and large indirect effect.
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Hi David, good post here, and interesting to separate out the direct and indirect aspects of the effect of advertising.
ReplyDeleteI sometimes think that advertising in general creates the overall sense that we should be consuming more, even though the specificity of particular brands is not so relevant.
So, when I buy a computer magazine, obviously its filled with adverts for new techy stuff, and articles about that techy stuff. I inevitably come away with the feeling that I need to buy some more techy stuff to keep up to date! (I don't buy those mags any more, unless I'm actively looking to upgrade something!)