Cultural Reflections And The Role Of Advertising In The Socio-Economic And National Development Of Nigeria

Essay text:

The study’s findings demonstrated the difficulty of ascertaining the role of the mass media including advertising on a nation’s social, economic and national development and modernization. However, some of the conclusions drawn from the exploration could be summarized as follows: (1) The Nigerian government as well as native-owned enterprises and public corporations do not use advertising adequately to promote their goods and services; (2) Nigerian advertisers used both Western or traditional African cultural values, but neither of them dominated the other; (3) Developmental themes were found in Nigerian mass media advertisements, but they tended to concentrate on individual instead of group goals as traditional African value system dictates; (4) The nature and target(s) of advertisements in Nigerian mass media demonstrated that the Nigerian economy is distorted and underdeveloped; (5) The underdeveloped nature is clearly demonstrated because the majority of consumer products and services advertised in Nigeria were of foreign origin and mostly non-essential; (6) The products advertised often targeted the elites because the Nigerian masses could not afford them; (7) Financial advertisements were the most dominant products and services of Nigerian origin; (80 Broadcast advertisements seemed to be more “democratic” than print advertisements because they promoted more products and services that the average Nigerian could afford Alozie, Emmanuel C...