A STUDY ON THE SOCIAL EFFECT OF ADVERTISING ON THE NIGERIAN STUDENTS

ABSTRACT

Advertisements affect our daily lives and as technology and the practice of marketing has developed over the course of history, we have become exposed to greater amounts of product and service campaigns. The purpose of advertisements is to educate the consumer with the goal of ultimately selling the product, and many companies and organizations would not be able to survive without the use of advertisements. Ultimately, it is a necessity for a business to prosper in a competitive market, but there are possible side-effects for the consumer that are beyond the intentions to buy.

The purpose of this thesis is to explore the effects advertisements play on the college student in particular. Different static/multimedia advertisements have been shown to various college students ranging in gender and background to discover the comprehensive ramifications of specific promotions to study the moral and ethical impact that advertisements play on students¶ moral intent. An analysis and conclusion will be given, along with ideas for possible future studies. Recommendations will also be stated for marketers to be morally responsible for the advertisements they portray so the audience is not effected in a way that can lead to unwanted consequences.

Ultimately, the results did not support the original hypotheses, leading to thoughtprovoking questions concerning our current marketing practices and the effectiveness of static and multimedia advertisements on college students. Future studies need to take place to reveal advertisements influencing the audience at hand.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

BACGROUND TO STUDY

Advertisements are part of our social environment in the 21^st century, and can be seen throughout any industrialized country. The average American is exposed to as many as 5,000 advertisements a day, stated by Jay Walker-Smith, and nearly 10,000,000 in their lifetime (Anderson & Palma, 2010). Ranging from print advertisements to commercials, consumers are bombarded with companies compelling them to purchase a product or service, and if the process of marketing and advertisements is not used in an ethical manner, disastrous results can occur; as such, the advertisements that are part of this environment can alter and potentially damage the audience to which they are being exposed (Gulas, 2000). For instance, certain advertisements can be seen as encouraging selfish, materialistic, and wicked desires (Pollay, 1986). Some have even argued that advertisements compete with prominent spiritual teachings of love, kindness, and goodness (Pollay, 1986).

Not all marketing advertisements are as damaging as others, but some can have long-term effects (Martin, 1993). It is important to note that negatively charged advertisements not only bring upon a change in the mental thinking of a subject, but also influence the actions of that subject (Capella, 2010).

STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

Advertising, like other promotional techniques, informs, persuades and reminds. It can change consumer’s beliefs, attitudes, images, and behavior. But for advertising to be effective on national level, enormous expenditures are required.Successful advertisements do not merely entertain, try to persuade the audience to buy, this is where the problem lies. People tend to have the notion that this persuasive quality of advertising has social effect on its audience, especially on students because they are still within the age of being influenced by the media. Hence, the essence of this study is to take a critical look into the social effects on Nigeria students having OS-POLY students as the population.

Objective of the study

The objective of this research study is to examine the short-term effects of advertisments on a person’s intention beyond that of purchasing desire. The focus of this research is to

1. find how advertisements affect the moral, ethical, and spiritual attitudes of its viewers.
2. To find out if popular familiar advertisement impact student negatively
3. To find out if advertising distort reality in Nigerian students

RESEARCH QUESTION

Hence, the current study attempts to answer the following research questions:

1. do some advertisements increase the likelihood of a college student committing an illegal act?
2. Do popular familiar advertisement impact student negatively
3. Does advertising distort reality in Nigerian students?

SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY

It is the anticipation of the researcher that the result and findings of this work will help a lot of people and institutions. For instance the advert practitioners would have the opportunity to understand to what extent civil servants and business community response to advert messages and of course, the total impact on their social behaviour.

Similarly, the practitioner would be exposed to the media mix that achieves better results, with respect to wielding influence on civil servants and business community with the applications of advertising tool. Marketers would benefit as the study places them in a better position to design good marketing strategy capable of influencing the consumers especially in cases where paid workers are involved The study would also benefit students and researchers towards understanding the intricacies and technicalities of directing any advert activities to civil servants and business community; it would also be of benefit to free lance readers for enrichment of general knowledge.

    1.6  SCOPE OF STUDY

The Enugu State under study was grouped as an area of study with emphasis on students in the state.

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