The Negative Impact Of Vaping On Children

Introduction

According to a report, published by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, many parents aren’t aware that the toxic chemicals contained in vaping products are harmful to their children. The advocacy advertisement for Know Vape claims that e-cigarettes pose risks such as secondhand exposure and accidental ingestion, with the intent to inform their audience of parents of the dangers they bring to their children from vaping. Because vaping smoke smells and tastes like candy a child might think it is candy causing them to try to consume the toxic liquid, which could potentially result in serious illness or even death. Know Vape’s design elements help to emphasize the seriousness of their initial argument that vaping is dangerous towards children through the use of ethos, pathos, and logos which induces a powerful emotional response from their audience.

Ethos

Know Vape is a nonprofit organization located in the Philippines that works with and is trusted by The Republic of Philippines Department of Health. Their goal is to stop vaping from becoming more popular among the population. They want everybody to know that vaping is just as dangerous as smoking tabaco as well as spread their influence and their knowledge on the harm that vaping can cause, such as accidental ingestion, inflammation, and tissue damage. The intended audience for the ad is parents who vape around young children. They include the image of a young boy and the sentence “A child might think it’s for them as well” to grab the reader’s attention and explain to parents why they shouldn’t vape around their children.

Pathos

The image of the little boy vaping is the main emotion inducting factor of the advocacy advertisement. He is sharply focused and directly in eyesight therefore making him one of the first parts of the ad that is noticed. This draws awareness to the fact that the ad will be about children in some way. The child is wearing a WALLE-E shirt which is connected to his childhood and innocence. WALLE-E is a movie that the average child at some point in their life have watched, have wanted to watch, or have heard other children talk about watching. The child also looks young and has a slight smile of his face which once again emphasizes his youth and innocence. He’s smiling because he thinks that vaping is okay, and nobody will be mad at him for doing it. If he were portraying guilt, knowing that vaping is bad, he would not be smiling but would instead be frowning or even crying. If he’s always surrounded by smoking through his parents, who nobody corrects or chastises for their harmful actions, he will automatically assume nobody will be mad if he does it since he is just following the actions that his parents have presented to him.

The fact that the child looks very young, aged 9-112, also plays an important role in the ad because if the child instead was a teenager the emotion response wouldn’t be as powerful. The emotional response would change not because teenage vaping is viewed as okay within society but because teenage smoking is more widely known, as it is quite often shown throughout social media, movies, and tv shows. When someone sees a photo of a child vaping their response would be along the lines of outrage and anger that a young child thinks vaping is “cool” or even acceptable behavior. It would make them question the environment that the child has grown up in and has been influenced by. People would also feel pity or sadness for what that child’s future will likely be like due to the bad influences that they are surrounded by.

Logos

Many parents who have already vaped or thinks that vaping is okay claim that if they use the “just flavor” vaping products they will not be affected or affect anyone else. But they are wrong because while the vaping products claim to be “just flavor” they are not, as they contain many chemicals that can cause inflammation and tissue damage. They also contain chemicals that affect children through secondhand exposure and accidental ingestion as Know Vape states in their ad. The ad has many elements to enhance their persuasiveness such as font, color, and overall organization. The ad uses Visuospatial Perception, which refers to our ability to process and interpret visual information about where objects are in space. The viewers eyes go from the bold red words “Cotton Candy,” to the area of smoke because they already have the image of cotton candy in their mind and smoke looks similar to cotton candy, then to the child because the almost oval shape of the smoke lead the eyes downward to find the source, then to the Know Vape hashtag because it is also in bold red words which is very similar to what they saw before, then to the health department logo and the Know Vape logo because it very close to the Know Vape hashtag and is also in color, a bold bright red and a bright green with yellow which stands out against the black background, and lastly to the words “With all the sweet fruity flavors” because it is the last bold red text in the ad and the last thing that is in color. Through the use of visuospatial perception, the viewer’s eyes are forced to go full circle around the ad starting with the words “Cotton Candy” and ending with them.

Another important factor of the advertisement is the use of their color choices and color isolation. When looking at the ad your eyes will immediately be drawn to the words “Cotton Candy” as it is in bright red. The ad uses color isolation, making the background and the surrounding areas black or a dark gray, to draw attention to one of the problems that the ad is addressing. If a child assumes a vaping product isn’t as dangerous as smoking they may try to consume the internal liquid or vape like they see their parents do, which could potentially result in exposure and accidental ingestion.

Conclusion

This advocacy advertisement effectively reaches their targeted audience, parents who vape. They are able to do this through the use of their main image, Visuospatial Perception, color isolation, and bold text. The ad is detailed, telling of what could happen if a child was near vaping products, yet simple and not clustered. At the end of the day anyone who looks at the ad will remember what they felt when they saw a young child vaping and will try to inform other parents as well as stop other teens/children from endangering themselves.