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the use of psychology to exploit or influence children for commercial purposes
Commercial Alert September 30, 1999
-- Sixty psychologists and psychiatrists sent a letter today to Dr.
Richard Suinn, President of the American Psychological Association,
urging the Association to restrict the participation of psychologists in
advertising or marketing to children. The letter follows.
September 30, 1999
Richard Suinn, PhD
President
American Psychological Association
Psychology Department
Colorado State University
Fort Collins, CO 80523
RE: The Use of Psychology to Exploit and Influence Children for
Commercial Purposes
Dear Dr. Suinn:
The American Psychological Association (APA) was founded to advance the
understanding of the human psyche in order to promote health. The APA's
founding documents articulate this mission in inspiring detail. The
organization is to "work to mitigate the causes of human suffering;" it
seeks to "improve the condition of both the individual and society," and
to "help the public in developing informed judgments."
That is a high calling. The APA's healing and helping mission is
accentuated by what the organization and its members are not supposed to
do -- namely "exploit or mislead other people."
We are writing today about the latter prohibition. We are concerned
that members of the APA are ignoring it, for monetary gain. They are
not using their knowledge to mitigate the causes of human suffering.
They are using it instead to promote and assist the commercial
exploitation and manipulation of children. As individuals, that is their
right, of course. But as a profession dedicated to human welfare,
psychologists have a responsibility to the public. The APA should not
condone such behavior among its members, nor should psychologists look
the other way.
Regrettably, a large gap has arisen between APA's mission and the drift
of the profession into helping corporations influence children for the
purpose of selling products to them. Advertising and marketing firms
have long used the insights and research methods of psychology in order
to sell products, of course. But today these practices are reaching
epidemic levels, and with a complicity on the part of the psychological
profession that exceeds that of the past. The result is an enormous
advertising and marketing onslaught that comprises, arguably, the
largest single psychological project ever undertaken. Yet, this great
undertaking remains largely ignored by the APA.
The sale of psychological expertise to advertisers to manipulate
children for monetary gain goes without comment let alone sanction. The
profession does very little to protect innocent children -- the people
it is supposed to help -- from the psychological cajoling and assaults
that it itself helps to create. This behavior is not even mentioned in
the APA's "Ethical Principles of Psychologists And Code of Conduct"
("Ethics Code").
Several countries and provinces have laws to protect children from the
attempts of adults to influence them in this way. For example, Sweden
and Norway prohibit television advertising directly targeting children
below twelve years of age. Greece bans television advertising of toys
to children between 7:00 a.m. and 10:00 p.m. Quebec prohibits
television advertising directed at children below the age of thirteen.
However, in the United States, children have no such protections, nor
any protection against the use of psychological insights and expertise
to manipulate or influence them.
If the APA stands for anything, and if it takes its own mission
seriously, it ought to expose and challenge this abuse of psychological
knowledge. It must not continue to tolerate by silence such abuse by
its own members.
Specifically, we urge the APA to:
1. Issue a formal public statement denouncing the use of psychological
techniques to assist corporate marketing and advertising to children;
and,
2. Amend the APA's Ethics Code to establish limits for psychologists
regarding the use of psychological knowledge or techniques to observe,
study, manipulate, harm, exploit, mislead, trick or deceive children for
commercial purposes; and,
3. Launch an ongoing campaign to probe, review and confront the use of
psychological research in advertising and marketing to children. The
campaign would include: (a) ongoing investigation of the use of the
tools of psychology in advertising, marketing and market research
targeted at children; (b) publication and ethical evaluation of these
findings; and, (c) the promotion of strategies to protect children
against commercial manipulation and exploitation by psychologists and
those who use the tools of psychology.
The use of psychological insight and methodology to bypass parents and
influence the behavior and desires of children is a crisis for the
profession of psychology. But it also presents a chance for the
profession to affirm its high public calling. The American public is
hungry for acts of principle and courage on the part of the professions,
and we urge the APA to take this step.
Sincerely,
Samella Abdullah, PhD
Neil Altman, PhD
Anita Barrows, PhD, Associate Faculty, Wright Institute, Berkeley, CA
Sharon A. Baker, MSPH, PhD, Research Scientist, University of Washington
Jack Block, PhD, Professor Emeritus, Psychology Department, U.C.
Berkeley
Lane Conn, PhD, Center for Psychological and Social Change, Harvard
Medical School
Sarah Conn, PhD, Instructor in Psychology, Harvard Medical School
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, PhD, Prof. of Psychology, Peter Drucker School
of Management, Claremont Grad. Univ.; author of Flow
Victor Daniels, PhD, Professor, Psychology Department, Sonoma State
University
Jeanette Diaz-Veizades, PhD, Faculty, Saybrook Institute and Research
Center, San Francisco
Samantha Dowdall, PhD, Transpersonal Counseling Center, Institute for
Transpersonal Psychology, Palo Alto, CA
Saul Eisen, PhD, Professor, Psychology Department, Sonoma State
University
Greg Fiest, PhD, Associate Professor, Psychology Department, College of
William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA
Diane Ehrenseft, PhD, Faculty, Wright Institute
Joseph Friedman, PhD
James Gabarino, PhD, Professor of Human Development, Cornell University;
author of Lost Boys
Chellis Glendinning, PhD, author of When Technology Wounds
Mary Gomes, PhD, Associate Professor, Psychology Department, Sonoma
State University
Leslie Gray, PhD, Director, Woodfish Institute
Steve Handwerker, PhD
Jane M. Healy, PhD, educational psychologist; author of Failure to
Connect
Susan Hillier, PhD, Associate Professor, Psychology Department, Sonoma
State University
Larry Jaffe, PhD
Zonya Johnson, PhD, Faculty, Saybrook Institute and Research Center, San
Francisco
Allen D. Kanner, PhD, Associate Faculty, Wright Institute
Ellyn Kaschak, PhD, Professor, San Jose State University, author of
Engendered Lives
Timothy J. Kasser, PhD, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Knox College
Robert E. Kay, MD, psychiatrist
Terry Kupers, MD, Faculty, Wright Institute
Lynne Layton, PhD, PhD, Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychology,
Harvard Medical School
Larry M. Leitner, PhD
Lenny Levis, PhD, Director, West Coast Children's Center, Kensington, CA
Susan Linn, EdD, Associate Director, Media Center, Judge Baker
Children's Ctr.; Instructor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
Richard Lichtman, PhD, Core Faculty, Wright Institute, Berkeley, CA
Judith Liebow, PhD, Director of Training, Children's Hospital, Oakland,
CA
Emily Loeb, PhD, Psychotherapy Institute, Berkeley, CA
David Lukoff, PhD, Faculty, Saybrook Institute and Research Center, San
Francisco
Ralph Metzner, PhD, Professor, California Institute of Integral Studies
Kate Moody, Director, EdD, Dyslexia Program at University of Texas
Medical Branch, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Neurology
Allison C. Morrill, JD, PhD, Research Scientist, New England Research
Institutes
Diane M. Morrison, PhD, Research Professor, Center for Policy and
Practice Research, University of Washington
Magdalena R. Naylor, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry,
University of Vermont; co-author of The Search For Meaning
Gilbert Newman, PhD, Director of Field Placement, Wright Institute
Margaret Pavel, PhD, Instructor, New College of San Francisco
Marc Pillisuk, PhD, Professor Emeritus, U.C. Davis; Faculty, Saybrook
Institute and Research Center
Susan Raeburn, PhD
Erika Rosenberg, PhD, Assistant Professor, College of William and Mary,
Williamsburg, VA
Richard Ryan, PhD, Professor of Clinical & Social Psychology, University
of Rochester
Fran Segal, PhD
Marilyn Senf, PhD, Berkeley Mental Health Adult Services
Laura Sewell, PhD, Faculty, Prescott College, AZ
Joseph S. Silverman, MD
Robert Slegal, PhD, Professor, Psychology Department, Sonoma State
University
Karen Spengenberg, PhD, Clinical Neuropsychologist, Northeast
Rehabilitation Center, Salem, NH
Valerie Stone, PhD, Assistant Professor, Psychology Department,
University of Denver
Alan Swope, PhD, Associate Professor, California School of Professional
Psychology Veronique Thompson, PhD, Institute Faculty, Wright Institute
Chera Van Berg, PhD, Palo Alto, CA
Art Warmath, PhD, Professor, Psychology Department, Sonoma State
University
David Watt, PhD, Berkeley, CA
cc: Henry Tomes, PhD, Executive Director for Public Interest Tiffany M.
Field, President, Division of Developmental Psychology
Beth J. Doll, PhD, President, Division of School Psychology
Curtis P. Haugtvedt, PhD, President, Society for Consumer Psychology
Cynthia J. Schellenbach, PhD, President, Division of Child, Youth, and
Family Services
Susan Holmes McDaniel, PhD, President, Division of Family Psychology
Frank Farley, PhD, President, Division of Media Psychology
William E. Pelham, PhD, President Pro Tem, Division of Clinical Child
Psychology
F. Daniel Armstrong, PhD, President Pro Tem, Society of Pediatric
Psychology
Thomas H. Ollendick, PhD, President, Society of Clinical Psychology
Andrea L. Solarz, PhD, President, Society for Community Research and
Action: Division of Community Psychology
<-------------letter ends here-------------->
For more information about how psychologists participate in advertising
and marketing to children, see
<http://www.essential.org/alert/psychology/apaletfactsheet.html>.
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Gary Ruskin | Commercial Alert
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