Influencers and Kids: The Power of Online Personalities | Liselot Hudders, PhD

The rise of influencers has changed the conversation around advertising, marketing, and behavior change in adults as well as children. How do influencers and their sponsored content impact children’s thoughts, feelings, and behaviors? On this episode of Screen Deep, host Kris Perry interviews Dr. Liselot Hudders, Professor of Marketing Ethics at Ghent University, to unpack her research on how influencing works, why influencers produce content aimed at youth, what children understand about digital advertising techniques, and how policy plays an important role in protecting children from deceptive marketing. She also explores issues around “kidfluencers” and the use of children in parent influencer content. In this episode, you will learn:Why children trust influencers and how it shapes their behaviorHow technological advances are allowing increasingly sophisticated influencer marketing techniques to reach kidsWhy sponsored content can be hard for children to recognize What influencer financial disclosures don’t accomplish (and why they are easy to miss) What parents can do to to counteract negative impacts of influencer content on childrenFor more resources and research on this topic visit the Learn and Explore section of the Children and Screens website (https://www.childrenandscreens.org)--------------Follow Children and Screens on: Facebook: Children and Screens: Institute of Digital Media and Child DevelopmentInstagram: @childrenandscreensLinkedIn: Children and Screens: Institute of Digital Media and Child DevelopmentX: @childrenscreensBluesky: @childrenandscreens.bsky.social---------------Music: 'Life in Silico' by Scott Buckley - released under CC-BY 4.0. www.scottbuckley.com.au