Brand, Identity and Reputation: Exploring, Creating New Realities ...

use games consoles (Childwise, 2001). This access to digital technology has the effect of exposing children to brand
communications on an unprecedented scale. Arguably, it may have the concomitant effect of empowering them as
consumers.
Websites like Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Club Penguin, and other Disney games are developed to appeal to the under
4s, beginning the process of consumerism. At least 37% of children aged between 5 and 16 have researched or bought
products online (Greenfield, 2004). In the anecdotal experience of one of the authors, the true figure is probably far
higher, given the use his children and their friends make of the internet as a source of purchasing information. So what
we are currently facing is a digitally savvy generation who grew up with an influx of technology exposure that they tend
to master at a much younger age than the previous generations. This phenomenon has resulted in the children being
more commercially aware. In fact, they believe that they are smarter consumers than their elder counterparts (Haynes et
al, 2002; Tinson & Nancarrow, 2005). Generation Z children have even been reported to have developed a cynical
attitude towards advertising and they view it as a mean to be used, which they can control, for their own benefit
(Childwise 2003). The influence that these technological advances have brought about to the world cannot be neglected.
It has been argued that the PCs and the internet are playing a vital part in the shaping of today‘s children, evolving their
knowledge and empowering them (Sutherland & Thompson, 2003). Previously, market researchers have assumed that
children developed an understanding of the commercial intent of advertising at about age ten. This may be changing,
although some marketing agencies may be exaggerating the self-awareness of Generation Z- witness the PhD agency‘s
viral video warning the marketing industry of these precocious consumers 5 , and, in particular, the sceptical comments
that have been posted.
Generation Z and Brands
It is argued that Generation Z are acquiring extensive brand knowledge and forming strong brand preferences at a
younger age than ever before (Achenreiner & John, 2003). It has been acknowledged that the ―new‖ media, which
refers mainly to the internet, has radically shaped children of generation Z‘s experience and understanding of brands
and influenced the way they think and learn (Greenfield, 2004; Narin et al., 2008). Historically, this knowledge has
been attained by direct experience of products and services which accrues over time (Achenreiner & John, 2003).
Access to the internet has radically accelerated this process and detached it from direct product experience because of
the presence of opinion-forming blogs and internet comment. What this means for brands, of course, is that engagement
with brand presence on the internet and mobile media can result in a strong negative or positive preference being
formed by a very early age, perhaps long before the ability to critically appraise commercial messages has developed.
Previous research has suggested that children go through a number of stages in their commercial awareness. They have
been said to recognize brands as young as 3 or 4 years old (Chaplin & John, 2005; Derscheid et al., 1996), and to
develop an evoked set of preferred brands within familiar product categories by age 7-8 (John, 1999). At a later stage of
development, children‘s views on brands develop from being perceptual and concrete to being conceptual in that they
start forming symbolic brand associations and linking the brand with their sense of self identity (Chaplin & John, 2005;
Achenreiner & John, 2003). Generation Z‘s access to the internet and their subsequent accelerated development as
consumers has meant that now children as young as 8 years old realize that having the right brands are the quickest way
to acceptance by reference groups (Kantrowitz & Wingert, 1999; Chaplin & John, 2005; Lindstorm and Seybold, 2003).
In their awareness of brand symbolism and its implications for self identity and group membership, Generation Z may
be exhibiting commercial awareness that is more like that of adults.
Concluding comment
This research suggests tentatively that Generation Z childrens‘ online experience may be having the effect of making
them more like adults in their understanding of and interaction with brands. This general trend may have some negative
social consequences, such as the fracture of traditional family power relations (McDermott et al, 2006; Ekström, 2007)
asw children become more asserting consumers. From a brand management perspective, it is important to better
understand both the positive and less positive changes in childrens‘ socialisation in order to address the new order of
children‘s online experience and brand consciousness.
References
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Consumer Psychology, Vol.13, 3, pp. 205-219.
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technology and e-learning‖, British Journal of Sociology of Education. Vol. 27 (1) (2008), pp. 97–110.
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5 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P81bb0Tzwbo&feature=player_embedded
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