With the intensity of the California gold rush, corporations are racing to stake their claim on the consumer
group formerly known as children. What was once the purview of a handful of companies has escalated into a gargantuan
enterprise estimated at over $15 billion annually. While parents struggle to set limits at home, marketing executives
work day and night to undermine their efforts with irresistible messages. In Consuming Kids, psychologist Susan
Linn takes a comprehensive and unsparing look at the demographic advertisers call "the kid market," taking
readers on a compelling and disconcerting journey through modern childhood as envisioned by commercial interests.
Children are now the focus of a marketing maelstrom, targets for everything from minivans to M&M counting books.
All aspects of children's lives -- their health, education, creativity, and values -- are at risk of being compromised
by their status in the marketplace. Interweaving real-life stories of marketing to children, child development
theory, the latest research, and what marketing experts themselves say about their work, Linn reveals the magnitude
of this problem and shows what can be done about it. With a foreword written by research psychologist and author
Penelope Leach, Consuming Kids is a call to action for parents, educators, legislators and anyone who cares about
the health and well being of children.