The effects of television advertising on materialism, parent-child conflict, and unhappiness: A review of research

In this article, we introduce a model on the unintended effects of advertising. This model describes the existing hypotheses about the impact of advertising on (a) materialism, (b) parent-child conflict, and (c) unhappiness. The validity of each of these hypotheses was investigated using a vote-counting analysis. Our analyses yielded a small to moderate effect size for the relation between advertising and materialism as well as a small to moderate effect size for the relation between advertising and parent-child conflict. However, support for the hypothesized relation between advertising and unhappiness was not found. The outcome of our vote-counting analysis provided several working hypotheses for further research as well as identified possible moderator variables that should be taken into account in future research. (C) 2003 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.