Ethical

Issues in Advertising
Integrated Marketing Communication

ATI NAGHSH Kingston University MA Advertising and the Creative Economy

Introduction
Advertising significantly affects the practice of our life, and therefore can both benefit and harm the society and human life. Advertising ethics, despite being a mainstream topic in advertising research (Hyman at al. 1994; Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009), remains a controversial issue on which a substantial debate is continued to take place. As advertising is argued to profoundly impact the world in terms of peoples values and behaviours (Foley, 1999) as well as their practice of lives and business (Hyman at al. 1994), the debate and discussion related to advertising ethics keep growing. This literature review begins with a brief overview of the history of advertising ethics and how it has been shaped. It then demonstrates a more detailed examination of ethic in advertising within recent literature in order to evaluate some of the core issues that advertising industry is currently experiencing while looking at responsible stakeholders of advertising ethics. Finally, by exploring the major ethical issues in marketing communication, it argues that companies have to consider ethical issued in advertising if they are looking for a long-term succeeds of their business.

History of Advertising Ethics

The subject has been researched and talked about by a wide range of direct and indirect participants, from academicians, practitioners and professionals and researchers, to religious and pontifical societies (e.g. Bishop, 1949; Pontifical Council for Social Communications, 1997). History of ethic in advertising goes back to 1949, when F. P. Bishop published one of the first books on advertising ethics. He recorded moral indictments of advertising as creating unworthy desires which misleads the consumer and encourages them to consumptionism. (Bishop, 1949). Later in 1961, Thomas Garrett, a philosophy professor and priest, examined some of ethical problems such as economic growth, persuasion, consumption, and potential monopoly power, noting that the Bishopss book cannot grasp what known as the ultimate. In 1986 Richard Pollay recounted the positions of humanities and social science scholars on advertisings unintended social and cultural consequences. Through the mid 80s the focus was on observing the ethics in advertising and how it affects the society. From 1980s to
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today the largest set of research on advertising ethics belongs to understanding consumers perceptions of objectionable advertising. This can be considered as adverts such as persuasive appeals, idealized imagery, dangerous products and targeting children (cited in Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009). Recent publication on advertising ethics (Spence and Heereken, 2005) examined several concerns of advertising such as truth, stereotyping and targeted advertising. They concluded the biggest ethical problem in advertising is the pervasiveness and unrestricted proliferation of advertising as this threatens to overwhelm all aspects of our private and public domains.

Advertising ethics in Contemporary Literature

Hyman at al. (1994) studied the presence of advertising ethics in ABI/Inform database and based on popularity of related articles and concluded that advertising ethics continues to be a mainstream topic in advertising research. It also can be mentioned that the major portion of marketing ethics literature belongs to articles on advertising ethics (Bol et al, 1993; Hyman at al. 1994). The areas that are accounted for highest notion and research in advertising ethics include: deceptive advertising (e.g. Attas, 1999; Shimp, 2010), advertising to children (e.g. Austin and Reed, 1999; Shimp, 2010; Snyder, 2011), stereotyping, including racial and sexual stereotypes (e.g. Spence and Heereken, 2005), ads for alcohol, tobacco and cigarette (e.g. Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009; Shimp, 2010), and negative political ads. However, despite being widely spoken, the subject is not yet exhausted, as only limited areas have been extensively researched while authors and journals need to contribute more to the subject. At the same time, lack of relevant theories, measurements and frameworks (cited in: Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009) as well as disinterest of practitioners in persuading ethics in the field due to the difficulty of operating daily operations based on published works (Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009) has led to a vague and ambiguous image of advertising ethics. Therefore, distinguishing ethical and unethical ads in many cased seems to be difficult and companies still take the risk of opting for advertising themes that can be considered as unethical.

With the growing amount of moral issues confronting advertising, how can companies draw the line between ethical and unethical advertising? There is no doubt that advertising have both benefits and harms for the society, but how carefully are companies considering the potential harms that their advertising might create? Murphy (1998) draws the attention to the reasons behind the lack of attention to ethics in advertising and its rather low status. He explains that there are three major parties involved in any advertising campaign, including advertisers (the company or brand who is being advertised), agencies (who create the and run the campaign) and media (which is the vehicle for transferring the campaign). Drumwrite and Murphy (2009) demonstrate that because most agencies have diverse clients who some have developed their own codes, the responsibility of decision making for ethical issues perceives an obligation. While each party has its own multiple objectives and motives, none of them undertakes the primary responsibility of nurturing ethical standards. Evaluating the subject from policy and regulations standpoint demonstrates that although there are some ethical codes of conducts for advertising practitioners to follow (i.e. the American Association of Advertising Agencies codes of conduct, cited in: Shimp, 2010), such regulations and codes by themselves cannot contribute enough to the public morality and social progress of the society (Brenkert, 1998). Hence, the role of practitioners and stakeholders in creating ethical and moral principles in their daily practices becomes more significant (Foley, 1999; Snyder, 2011). Self-regulatory initiatives such as Advertising standards Authority (UK) might be helpful in regulating the industry and therefore improve the current status of ethics in advertising. This can also be viewed form the perspective of power amongst all parties involved in advertising. As the equilibrium of responsibility and power significantly affects advertising ethics conduction in any advertising campaign (Davis et al., 1980), it can be argued that if any of mentioned parties do not pay enough attention to their ethical and social responsibilities, it could ultimately lead to loosing their power. Since the society is moving towards more transparency and ethical actions in the light on information age, the consumer choice has been significantly affected (Botan, 1997). With the enormous power of the Internet and social media, consumers are becoming more aware while sharing their
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opinions likes and dislikes online, leading to advertisers loss of control over the message, transparency and privacy (Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009). Such knowledge and awareness can proactively affect advertising industry with consumers loosing their trust in advertising (Snyder, 2011). It has been noted by industry leaders in Drumwrite and Murphy (2009) research that consumers are now actively participating in creating, manipulating, and judging the message, making a complex situation for advertising agencies and advertisers. Another important part of advertising ethics is the social responsibility of the firm, which is usually addressed as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), that is, the obligation of the organization to be ethical, accountable, and reactive to society needs (Clow and Baak, 2007; Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009). There has been a general acceptance amongst business experts that socially responsible organizations are more successful in long term. Engaging in positive activities can enhance the company image through positive publicity and therefore escalate customer loyalty. Social responsibility audit can contribute towards a clear-cut and ethical guideline for the organization. Having said that, paying attention to social responsibilities without considering the financial or economic responsibilities can also cause failure of the firm (Murphy, 1998). Consequently, a balanced approach appears to be the solution towards having successful advertising firms and higher status of ethics in advertising. Furthermore, advertising has been referred to as communication and hence it can be argued that both parties involved in the communication are likely to be sharing the outcome. On this ground, Attas (1999) claims that even for deceptive advertising, it is important to considerer the responsibility of both advertiser and consumer to draw the line between misleading and miscomprehension or misinterpretation, as no communication is immune from being miscomprehended. Such standpoint on deceptive advertising implies the difficulty in objectifying the nature of advertising.

Ethical Issues in Marketing Communication

This section briefly explores the major subjects and concerns in relation to ethical issues of marketing communication and specifically advertising.

As a wide definition, ethics is described as the matter of right or wrong; the moral principle that governs the individual or societys behaviour. Targeting is one of the main stages in marketing that is significantly engaged with ethics. The main concern here according to research, is related to targeting those segments which are considered as vulnerable, such as children and teens, ethnic groups and races, and economically disadvantaged people (Shimp, 2010; Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009). It is even more criticised when adult oriented products (i.e. tobacco and alcohol) or unhealthy products (i.e. fast food) are targeted at children (Shimp, 2010; Austin and Reed, 1999). In general, the chief unethical advertisings are classified as following (Shimp, 2010; Drumwrite and Murphy, 2009): - - - - - - Untruthful or deceptive Manipulative Offensive or bad taste Creating stereotypes Persuading people to buy things they do not really need Playing on peoples fears and insecurities

Although such claims cannot be taken away from advertising, it is worth mentioning that advertising does not hold a monopoly on them. In fact, there are several segments of the society involved and sometimes even it is the society as whole who creates such properties. This of course would not mean that advertising can get away with such arguments, but it does show that the blame cannot only be held on advertising as the sole participant of unethicality within the society. Moreover, in a recent study of ethical advertising, five unethical practices have been illustrated by Snyder (2011) to build consumer trust, including: 1. Protecting children: Making sure that children as vulnerable group who may not be aware of the persuasive nature of advertising, can distinguish advertising from other subjects such as news or entertaining programs. 2. Indistinct notions of advertising: Draw the line between advertising with editorial and entertainment to provide users with frankness instead of deception.
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3. Viral messaging and user-generated content: Making the product endorsement clear by identifying whether someone is endorsing a product or brand on his own or if they have been paid to do so. 4. Pharmaceutical advertising: Avoiding or limiting prescription drug ads and making sure that advertising is done in a serious manner. 5. Behavioural advertising: Using enhanced ethics in advertising in a transparent and ethical manner. Although the above-mentioned tasks may seem to be limiting the power of advertising, Snyder (2011) argues that consumers will reward the ethical ads while the unethical ones would be punished, and therefore ethical advertising makes the business more successful in long-term.

Conclusion
Advertising has been criticised frequently for not taking ethicality into account as much as expected. In fact, companies still struggle (or maybe avoid) applying published ethical issues to their daily operations. This review argues that despite being a mainstream, advertising ethics still needs further research and investigation due to its impact on the society and individuals life. The study looks deeply into the ethical issues facing advertising stakeholders, including advertisers (firms and companies), agencies, and media and suggests that all of them should take the responsibility of implementing ethical codes in the advertising campaigns, in order to retain their power and be successful in long-term. It also studies several pitfalls associated with advertising ethics, which have been extensively discussed and examined in the literature, and suggests that both federation rules (i.e. governmental associations) and self-regulatory codes of ethics are necessary to make the advertising industry as ethical as it ideally could become. Finally, it argues that although being ethical in some points might limit the power and even creativity of advertising, such justifications could not be accepted because of advertisings vast impact on the society, even if it does not hold a monopoly in that field.
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 References
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