The headline is enough to make some people’s skin crawl. Shouldn’t we let children be children and wait to see them as consumers until it’s necessary? In a negative sense, it seems speculative to see children as consumers – and naive at the same time. Children are “exposed” to influence at an early age, whether we like it or not. And – children’s influence on us parents seems to start earlier than we like to admit.
Qualitative insights in children
How to involve children in research in an ethical way? How to capture children in research?
It’s about focusing on topics that touch on understanding the drivers of children’s consumer behavior. And that includes the cognitive, emotional, affective, motor, social as well as the environmental.
Who helped you choose a mobile phone or is behind much of what's in the fridge?
Lene Thorsen of Innsikteriet shares advice and her own experiences with children as a target group. Here are 10 tips for organizing and conducting qualitative insight work with children:
1. The psychological development level of the age group
From being rational and selfish, children at some point become more social and concerned with what others think, feel and believe. Without becoming too comprehensive and theoretical, there are certain characteristics based on age that are important to take into account both when choosing a method, approach and the way you analyze and observe them: (e.g. based on Jean Piaget’s perception theory of development)
- 4 -7 years: Smallest. They are to some extent visual without quite being able to say why, e.g. they choose the red package or drink because their favorite color is red. They have multiple individual perceptions.
- 7-11 years: “Tweenagers” (the pre-teen stage): They are more analytical and social. They think more consequentially “what if I do this – what happens then”? The need to emphasize that “I’m not a kid anymore” is strong. They make choices based on simpler analyses such as symbolism and social guidelines. The why is more in focus.
- 11-16 years: Teens. Here they become more reflective and social. They want to make choices based on reflection and strategies that are linked to social belonging. They become better at looking at context, for example, at school they choose something, with parents something else. They adapt depending on where they are and the situation to a much greater extent. The context itself is very important in this target group and they want to be “seen as an adult”.
2. The all-important first impression
“Basically, it’s about setting the right scene. It’s important to create a sense of security that they want to talk to us alone without their parents present. They need to feel comfortable and relaxed with us. This means that we have to treat them with respect and consideration. Show them around the room, tell them what we’re going to do together.
Most often, we invite the children together with a friend so that they know someone. That's enough to provide a degree of security. At the same time, the parents are only a room away
3. We speak different languages – which makes observation all the more important
The older they get (tweenagers and teenagers) it can often be wiser to get an “acceptance” from them on what is innate to say, rather than falling into the trap of being too cool in the pursuit of being like them. The younger the children, the more limited their language, the more important observation and simple tasks become.
4. Arrange the room – there is a lot that can become play equipment
We learned this during one of our first surveys with children (aged 5-6 years). We had sought insight from professionals and colleagues with experience, but had forgotten one important thing. In our eagerness to facilitate, we had placed beanbags in the room in the hope that this would create a cozy atmosphere. The downside was that the children, by chance and once they were really warm, discovered how much fun it was to slide and play with these bags.
5. Avoid too much sugar and drink
It’s easy to be tempted to organize treats and cuddles. This can quickly tip over into too much “activity” and frequent visits to the toilet. It’s fine to give them something to eat, but it should be towards the end as a “reward”. If you don’t, you may end up with little time and little flow in the conversation.
6. Child is wobbly – how to get past it
They shouldn’t feel like we’re the teacher at school. They need to be more involved and there needs to be less structure. Let them steer and influence the process, and here there can be different approaches. In our experience, asking them what they think doesn’t get you very far – they need to be involved.
7. Capture children’s sincere, spontaneous and creative nature.
They are far more creative than us adults. They don’t have the same barriers to drawing, making prototypes and images. Children are generally more emotional and good at showing what they mean with facial expressions, body language and images. According to psychologist Daniel Kahneman in his book Thinking, Fast and Slow, our brains have two operating systems. System 1 (fast thinking) and system 2 (slow thinking). Children think far more automatically in system 1 than we adults do. This means that they process faster, irrationally, emotionally, automatically, unconsciously and impulsively.
8. Games and fun tasks
The children’s creative side means that they both enjoy and find it exciting to be involved in various tasks. It simply comes more naturally to them.
"Tell me, and i forgot" "Show me, and I remember" "Involve me, and I understand".
Some methods (projective techniques) we have good experience with here are: Storytelling, figure drawing, completing sentences, image perceptions, different choice options to name a few.
9. Everyone must participate
A certain amount of over-recruitment is common in order to get enough participants in a focus group. This means that we sometimes have to send people home because the group is full. We never do that with children. They have often been looking forward to this and find it harder to understand that they are not allowed to take part – after all.
10. Finish on time
A focus group with children does not have the same length as a regular focus group with adults. We recommend a school lesson or up to one hour in duration. This can be stretched somewhat depending on the age of the children and any breaks.
For more qualitative insights towards children!