Children are “active decision makers in family economies,” according to YouGov in releasing the results of a recent survey examining kids’ influence on their parents’ buying decisions.
The survey analyzes kids’ influence across a range of categories, noting that young children can hold as much persuasive power as teens in those decisions..
While the study analyzes responses from parents with children aged 6-17, the following results pertain solely to those parents with children aged 12-17.
Examining categories in which an adult makes the purchases, the report finds – not surprisingly – that teens are most likely to have at least some degree of influence over purchases the adults make for them:
- Apparel for the teen to wear (96% of teens having some degree of influence);
- Personal care products for the teen (93%); and
- Footwear for the teen (93%).
Teens also wield a significant amount of influence over adults’ purchases of in-home entertainment content (78%) and in-home gaming systems (74%), but less so over in-home entertainment devices (47%) and the parents’ hand-held mobile products (42%).
Still, roughly 1 in 5 say that the teen picks the parent’s mobile device independently (7%) or with the parent (11%).
When it comes to categories in which households have made a purchase during the prior year, parents were most likely to ascribe some degree of purchase influence to their teens in the following areas:
- Which fast-food restaurants to go to (95%);
- Types of out-of-home entertainment/sports/recreation to attend or do (93%);
- Where to shop for clothes for the teen (90%);
- Which sit-down restaurants to go to (88%); and
- Where to shop for footwear for the teen (88%).
Interestingly, half of parents said their teens influence where to shop for in-home entertainment and technology devices, and close to half said they influence which vehicle to purchase or lease (45%) and where they go on vacations without their children (44%).
For more results, see the full study, which can be accessed here.