The York Scholar

Abstract

This research explored the relationship between children being exposed to tobacco advertisements and the psychological effects of these exposures. The focus of this research was on the applications of behavioral learning theories (such as classical and operant conditioning) to tobacco ads, psychological tactics used by tobacco advertisers to induce children to purchase their products, and the effectiveness of the psychological tactics in getting children to purchase tobacco products. It was found that repeated exposure to tobacco ads and smoking shown in movies and other media, causes children to see smoking as being something social and fun that many people do. Also, sponsoring of sports events causes smoking to appear to promote athleticism. Evidence found by numerous studies showed that comprehensive tobacco bans reduce smoking rates. It also showed that increases in tobacco advertising causes significant increases in youth smoking. It was concluded that tobacco ads do use psychological tactics that convince children to believe that smoking is good. The positive attitude that children develop towards smoking causes them to smoke. Then their addiction keeps them smoking.

A cigarette is one of the only consumer products which, if consumed, kills. Tobacco kills 4 million people today, over 70% of them in the developing world. The tobacco industry’s products will kill 10 million people by the first quarter of the next century; many of them will be in the prime of their lives (Cordry, 2001).

Wade Hampton, a fifty-one year old former smoker, began to smoke at the age of fourteen or fifteen years old. By eighteen years old Hampton was hooked on cigarettes. In 1994, he was diagnosed with throat cancer and cancer of the larynx. Today he has a removed voice box and a permanent opening in his throat (Heyes, 1999). Wade wishes that he never made that decision to start smoking.

This decision to smoke is enhanced by advertising. The addictiveness of tobacco and its sales and promotion tactics severely handicap people’s freedom to make informed decisions about choosing to smoke. The tobacco industry has a history of using deceptive practices in advertisements. Beginning in the 1920’s, before there was actual proof (only suspicions) that smoking caused lung cancer; smokers began to notice that smoking made their throats irritated, causing them to cough. Cigarette makers responded to this concern by using celebrities and even doctors in their advertisements to make false claims that their cigarettes would not irritate their user’s throats (Cordry, 2001).