Could Animated Movie Characters Drive Children’s Preferences in Choosing A Product? - Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Folklore, Language, Education and Exhibition (ICOFLEX 2019)

Aug 28, 2026

The study examines how animated movie characters affect children’s preferences when selecting products and evaluates the efficiency of such characters in building brand awareness in children’s minds. Qualitative methods were used, including in-depth interviews and observations with participants from three preschool institutions. Findings indicate animated characters can increase children’s purchase requests, yet they do not effectively create brand awareness, because children remember characters and product categories rather than brands.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

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Pages5

Reading Time13 min

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ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION

Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 512 Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Folklore, Language, Education and Exhibition (ICOFLEX 2019) Could Animated Movie Characters Drive Children’s Preferences in Choosing A Product? Endah Widati 1 * 1Faculty of Education and Social Sciences, Universitas Indraprasta PGRI, Jakarta, Indonesia. *Corresponding author. Email: [endahwidati82@gmail.com](endahwidati82@gmail.com) ABSTRACT Television is one of modern culture media, which seen by almost people within ages. One of the segments who watch TV is children. Children watch animated movie and have favorable animated movie characters. They might choose something based on their favorable animated characters. This behavior is seen as the opportunity by marketers for years. Some researches explained the issue of child marketing. Thus, the companies use animated movie characters to encourage children’s purchase request. This study aims at understanding the children’s preference in choosing a product which using animated movie characters and how efficiently the animated movie characters in creating brand awareness in children’s mind. The research used a qualitative methodology. The in depth interviews and observations of the participants from 3 preschools are conducted in collecting the data. The result shows that animated movie characters can drive the children’s purchase request and are not an effective way to create brand awareness in children’s mind, since the children only remember the animated movie characters and product category not the brands. The research will contribute to better understanding of how and why children choose the specific products, besides to give the companies alternative way to build brand awareness to children. Keywords: Animated movie character, Purchase request, Children’spreference, Brand awareness 1. INTRODUCTION Since television invented in 1927, and start its commercial program on 1941 [1], television have become one of the most modern media, which seen by almost people within age. One of the segments who watch TV is children. Television offers children’s programs such as animated cartoon, children series shows, etc. Animated cartoon as children’s favorite program, has been existed and entertained people more than 100 years. The first animated film was Humorous Phases of Funny Faces, which released by Vitagraph in 1906 [2] . For years, many of cartoonist creates cartoon characters and many animation companies were established, such as MetroGoldwyn-Mayer (1924), Disney (1922), Marvel Comic (1939), etc. At the times, products for children are produced. In order to attract them, Company should determine the best strategy to influences children’s behavior and decision toward product. As a consumer, children tend to be vulnerable because they lack of cognitive skills primarily for those who under eight years [3] . Psychologically, children in the infancy tend to process information from simple perception. Children will process the initial information starting from low-level featural information [4] such as color, form, sound, movement, texture, and soon. Furthermore, animated movie also depicts children the real life or even imagination. Animated movie also gives pleasure, which sometimes cannot explain, funny and entertain. That’s why cartoon can give higher impact on children memories. Children have become potential market because they can influence parents to buy a product. The number of children primarily young children is getting bigger in few countries, e.g in Indonesia, for 2018 estimated at 47.61 million children, with ages between 0 – 9 years. Marketers use cartoon and animated characters as an attraction forchildren to choose the product for more than years. It because children watch animation movie and have favorable animated characters. In other words, cartoon becomes a part of children daily life and have an undefining bond [3] . Th

FAQs

What is the main purpose of this study?

To understand children’s preferences in choosing products that use animated movie characters and to assess how effectively these characters create brand awareness in children’s minds.

What research method was used?

The study used a qualitative methodology, conducting in-depth interviews and observations with participants from three preschools to collect data.

Do animated movie characters effectively build brand awareness in children?

No. Results show children mainly remember the animated characters and the product category, not the brands.

Aug 28, 2026

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