Answer the following questions about the text. 1. How far do you agree that if big companies stop advertising they will reduce the price of their goods?

1. How far do you agree that if big companies stop advertising they will reduce the price of their goods?

2. What do you think are the functions of advertisements?

3. How far do you share the author’s point of view that “small ads” perform a useful service to the community?

4. Are you interested in an “agony” column?

Text D

Why is Television Advertising Capable of Manipulating People?

Nowadays almost everybody watches TV. We have a large selection of channels and programmes and almost every channel is financed by advertising. Advertising on TV must be very profitable otherwise the companies would not spend so much money on it. Are we stupid then? We obviously buy the products after having seen the advertisements. No, we are not stupid, we are just being manipulated. But how?

The advertisements are repeated over and over again. When you have seen them about 50 times you subconsciously believe they are a good product. Then, when you go shopping and have three similar products to choose from, you remember the ad­vertisements and pick the one you think is the best. That is, the product that had the advertisements that convinced you the most. I do not think that the majority of people realise that they are affected by advertisements. The advertisers also take advantage of people’s natural curiosity. They advertise products before the stores get them. When there is a product that you have not seen before, it is only natural to become curious. This kind of advertising is almost always done to advertise new films. They put together a 45 second advertisement with all the exciting parts from the film and you think I have got to see the rest of it, I will go and see that film when it comes out.

Films and popcorn, how many people have not had popcorn at the cinema? We seem to attach a certain product to a special occasion. The advertisers take advantage of this and they show us beautiful people in the adverts. We see an advertisement when it is summer, where everybody is at the beach having fun and they are all drinking Fanta. When we go to the beach we fancy a drink, so why not Fanta? We make a connection. This kind of advertisement works in two ways. We see them in the winter too and then the beach pictures make us feel good. When we go out and buy a Fanta we remember the pictures and we think about the sum­mer and feel good.

In contrast to the advertisements where we see beautiful people on exotic beaches we have the ones where everyday people come forward and tell us about their brilliant experiences of the product. We identify with these people and it is easy to believe what they are telling us. For example people in washing powder or toothpaste adverts. What we forget to think about is that these people will be paid to say these things.

Famous people are also used to promote their own and other products. They often make the advertisement look like a talk show with a studio audience. We do not always realise that we are watching an advertisement. How can we resist buying a skin cream that is recommended by a beautiful star who looks at least ten years younger than she really is? Who doesn't want to look 30 when they are 40? What we do not think about is how many face lifts these people have had.

One could say that we are all being manipulated one way or another. We do not even realise it sometimes or we do not want to admit it. The advertisements are endlessly repeated and in the end we begin to believe them. We are all curious and want to see if a product is as good as the advertisers say it is. Furthermore we also attach certain products to certain occasions which makes us further influenced by the advertisements. When famous people tell us how great a particular product is, it is hard to resist buying it, even though there may be a similar product which is much cheaper, only it has not been promoted so well. We are not stupid, but the advertisers are very clever and know exactly how to manipulate people.