Exploration of Parental Advertising Literacy and Parental Mediation: Influencer Marketing of Media Character Toy and Merchandise

Abstract

This study uncovers parents’ advertising literacy and their mediation strategies of influencers’ commercial videos that contain media character merchandise. Thirty-five semi-structured interviews were conducted with parents of preschool-aged children currently living in the United States. Few parents could articulate how influencer marketing works on social media in detail. For a majority of parents, influencer marketing was powerful and alluring but also inappropriate for young children. Popular media characters were limitedly discussed as a strategy to attract young children. While multiple mediation strategies were shared, parents with higher affective and moral advertising literacy tended to practice either restrictive mediation or active mediation. Practical implications for scholars and educators are discussed.

Acknowledgments

The author thanks Dr. Michelle Nelson for guiding and supporting the research and all the parents for enabling this research to be possible.

Declaration of Interest

No conflicts of interest or benefits were reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by American Academy of Advertising under Doctoral Dissertation Grant Competition.

Notes on contributors

Regina Jihea Ahn

Regina Jihea Ahn (PhD, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Strategic Communication, School of Communication, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA.