Children and materialism

Anyone with children will connect with a recent UNICEF report that says materialism is increasingly dominating the lives of children in the UK. Busy, guilt-ridden parents, who have little quality time to spend with their families, disburden their consciences by helping their kids amass all kinds of useless items. This materialism was also an important driver behind the recent riots. So what has happened?

The issue is complex, with the media and advertising playing a big role, as well as guilt-ridden parents. We human beings are compulsive comparers. We compare ourselves not with royalty and billionaires, but with people like ourselves. If other kids in the class and friends have a new gadget, that adds an additional reason why your kid should also have that gadget. If the conscience of the parent is not prickled by the fact of other children possessing that item, then there is always pester power. Either way, whether by guilty conscience or by submission to pester power, the parent will buy the same item.

I am not sure what the solution is. Advertising and the media must play a role. Parents need to spend more time with their children. A weekly visit to the local library, for example, would be more productive than time spent playing electronic games. Ultimately, we must learn to stop being compulsive comparers. Some comparison is adaptive and a motivation for self-improvement. But taken to an extreme, it becomes maladaptive and counter-productive. We must learn to be our individual selves.