News Flash-Kids Like Cartoons On Their Cereal Boxes!

This should come as no shock, but researchers have discovered that if you put a cartoon on a cereal box, the kids will like what they are eating much more than if the box was plain.    To quote the great philosopher, Charlie Sheen--"well duhhhh!"    But the study is still interesting.. Don't know about you, but as a kid, I used to eat cereal day and nite.  Literally. (And I never knew I was gluten intolerant!)   But didn't matter!  It was so much fun to read the box while I was downing those Corn Flakes,  Frosted Flakes, any kind of Flakes!!   The puzzles on the back, the free stuff inside --all the tricks of the trade to market their wares to kids.  It's nothing new.

So it should come as no surprise that a recent study has shown that if there are cartoon characters on the outside of the box, kids will probably like the cereal more, even though it might not be any better quality than any other brand.  That's pretty interesting.

According to a USA Today article:

They had 80 kids, ages 4 to 6, look at one of four boxes of a "new" cereal

created for the experiment. The cereals were called Healthy Bits and Sugar Bits. One box of each type had a cartoon character on the front, and one of each type didn't. Cartoon penguins Mumble and Gloria from the movie Happy Feet were used on the packages.

                   Gee--which cereal do you think they liked better? 

  I don't find this too shocking, do you?  Doesn't this happen to you adults too?  If you saw a box in an electronics store that said "Savemore Tablet Computer" and right next to it a nice display showing the "Apple Ipad 2", which one would you like more, even if the other one had 5 times the memory?

We're so brainwashed with advertising.  And kids are probably hit with more commercials per minute on TV than we are, but we get our share too.

  So don't you go blaming your nieve youngsters for being the "impressionable" ones.  It happens to us all. 

  (As i drink my overpriced boutiquey coffee that doesn't taste any better than the swill you buy at the gas station!!!)