Abstract
Advertising is an essential tool in influencing the customer's buying behavior. However, customers tend to have various levels of understanding and decoding advertising messages. Even though children do not have purchasing power themselves, they still create a key customer segment that can influence the purchase decision of the whole family. The paper focuses on how media usage by children and their attitudes towards advertisements determines their buying behavior. The main purpose of the research is to present and describe how children's advertising literacy develops and its connection with the concept of the theory of mind. The relevance of the decision of this scientific problem is that according to several types of research, children are increasingly targeted through various advertising media. Even though their advertising literacy is not fully developed yet. However, nowadays, there is a growing importance of media in our lives and a need to socialize children as consumers because they represent a huge market for advertisers. An empirical study was carried out by designing a questionnaire filled by Slovak children between the ages of 11 and 15. The advertising impact and the degree of impact of the selected types of advertising media on children's consumer behavior were evaluated. The study involved the online method of computer-assisted web interviewing to investigate the influence of advertising media. The authors assessed the degree of the disruptive effect of the selected advertising media on children and the perception of a chosen medium within gender. The most and the least influential type of media were identified. The findings showed no significant difference within gender in the case of advertising media perception by children. The research empirically confirmed and theoretically proved commercial messages aimed at children through different kinds of traditional and electronic media. According to the results, children's buying behavior is mostly influenced by advertising on social media platforms. This type of media mostly integrates sponsored content which has a huge influence on decision making and forming future preferences. The research results can be helpful for further research of commercial messages of social media aimed at children and how those messages affect the whole family and children's future preferences.
Highlights
Many societal and scientific discussions about the appropriateness and fairness of advertising aimed at children have been held for decades
Based on the correlation (Tab. 1), according to Pearson's correlation coefficient, the findings showed that children disturbed by Internet advertising are disturbed by television advertising and advertising on social media platforms
It was found out that children generally have a low level of advertising literacy compared to adults
Summary
Many societal and scientific discussions about the appropriateness and fairness of advertising aimed at children have been held for decades. Advertising literacy means that a wide range of knowledge, attitudes, and skills is needed to process an advertising message critically. It incorporates a conceptual and attitudinal dimension that gradually evolves during their lives, from simple to more sophisticated knowledge of the nature and functioning of advertising (Hudders et al, 2017). Children are defined as a target group with an emphasis on developing their understanding of advertising. Their development and behavior as consumers were analyzed. The assumption of the advertising media's influence on children's consumer behavior is expressed. The online method of questionnaire data collection CAWI - computer-assisted web interviewing was used
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
