Television ads target, affect
certain audiences
Experts explainad
techniques,viewer reactions
 By
Sarah Szczepanski
Assistant Features Editor
Most people planning to watch "Friends" or "ER"
on television tonight give little thought to the fact that they will
be one of the billions of viewers sold by NBC to its advertisers.
"The mass media is supported by selling advertising,"
said Stephen Robb, an associate professor of communication. "They design
programs to attract an audience. Then they sell the audience to the
advertisers."
According to Robb there is a different type of
audience who would watch CNN as opposed to the audience who would watch
a show like the Grammy Awards or other shows such as "Friends" or "Will
& Grace."
"It’s an interesting strategy," Robb said.
"They’re trying to send the right message to the right audience."
Robb said advertisers can’t measure how many
people are actually responding to an ad; rather, all advertisers know
is roughly how large the audience will be at a particular time. For
example, 16.9 percent of households watch "ER," according to the "2001
World Almanac and Book of Facts."
But advertisers don’t know how many of these
people will react to the ads because in order for someone to respond
to an ad, they must have been initially interested in what the product
is, Robb said.
"It’s called aperture," Robb said. "If a person
is interested in buying a car, then they will look at the ads about
cars."
 Robb
said the goal of a simple ad is to get a response, and when advertising
uses sex appeal, the ads are trying to motivate action. "They try to
do this by gaining attention and the model functions as this attention
getter," he said.
But there is a problem with some of the concepts
of advertising that goes beyond producing a simple advertisement, according
to Jean Kilbourne in her book "Can’t Buy My Love."
"Just as children are sold to the toy industry
and junk food industry by programs, video games and films, woman are
sold to the diet industry by the magazines we read and the television
programs we watch, almost all of which make us feel anxious about our
weight," said Kilbourne in her book.
Sue Eiler, a clinical social worker at Purdue University
Student Health Center who leads a support group that counsels women
with eating problems, said she has seen the effects of what Kilbourne
said.
"It’s culturally common," said Eiler. "Do
I have people come in and say it (a body image problem) is directly
because of one ad? No. But I do see women who come in who are distressed
about their bodies that become even more distressed."
Sometimes in advertisements, parts of models are
spliced together in a picture to create a perfect image.
But Amanda Diekman, an assistant professor of
psychology, said the unrealistic images do not have negative effects
if the viewer perceives the model as out of reach aesthetically. The
viewers will put that model in a social grouping other than themselves.
She said the problem lies in people who don’t
put themselves in a different group. "Cindy Crawford looks like the
girl next door," Diekman said. "People will try to compare themselves
with her. People may think ‘Oh, if I just lose 10 pounds, then
I can look like her’ even if they really can’t do that."
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