The impact of television advertising on emerging adulthood: Hedonic consumption and narcissistic defense

The psychosocial task of identity formation, a defining feature of the transition into adulthood, has become a protracted endeavor of self-exploration in Western societies due to declines in the consensus of social norms, changing economic conditions, and the gradual deterioration of social structures that typically guide lifespan development. This elongated psychosocial transition, often termed emerging adulthood, extends the psychological vulnerability associated with identity confusion well beyond adolescence. As the social anomie of Western societies continues to obfuscate the transition into adulthood, emerging adults are primed to adopt more passive approaches to identity development and increasingly rely on mass culture to provide norms for social role functioning. In the United States, advertising and other mass media influences are continually shaping social perceptions of identity commitments. In order to maintain mass cultural appeal, advertising campaigns have begun to employ postmodern aesthetics and aggrandize postmodern principles such that the persuasive communication contained within advertising narratives is masked by the allure of a wished-for hyperreality. The present study explores the impact that furtive persuasive communication and seductive hyperrealities have on identity development in emerging adulthood. This qualitative investigation applies a postmodern literary method of textual analysis (Stem, 1996) to three television commercials advertising hedonic products. The literary deconstruction of these advertisements describe the dynamic by which persuasive communication in television commercials attacks consumers' self-worth and subsequently amplifies emotional needs for peak gratification experiences, altogether activating a self-regulatory cycle of narcissism (Morf & Rhodewalt, 2001). The author argues that emerging adults in the United States are more responsive to these attacks on self-worth as a result of heightened psychosocial pressure to resolve identity crises while simultaneously maintaining one's social desirability. The proposition that narcissistic defenses have become a substitute for more comprehensive explorations of identity commitments among emerging adults is discussed and suggestions for future research are made.