Advertising in Digital Games: A Review from the Perspective of Children and Parents

Abstract

The problem of this study, which is based on understanding the interactions of children with the brands in digital games, is to understand children’s recognition of the brands in digital games with the variables of the type of advertisement, in-game factors and screen time. In this qualitative study, a two-session focus group interview was conducted with the children and their mothers separately. Children are important for this study due to their age, because on the one hand, they go through the consumer socialization process, and on the other hand, since they do not have the ability to separate media content from commercial content, they are exposed to ads. As a result of the study, it is observed that parents were in conflict with their children regarding screen time management and they interfere with their children’s screen time. However, a significant part of the parents is not aware of the ads in digital games and do not consider in-game advertising as a risk factor for their children. Additionally, it is seen that the high prevalence of unhealthy food advertisements in digital games causes children to make unreasonable demands and this is considered as a serious issue in a process they learn to be a consumer.

Keywords

• dijital oyun
• oyun-i̇çi reklam
• çocuklar, zula
• marka farkındalığı
• advertising
• in-game advertising
• children
• zula
• brand awareness