The phenomenon was first confusing before worrying, explains the Swiss daily The weather. In the world of children’s YouTube videos and “kids unboxing”, Ryan Kaji is king. The 10-year-old boy and his two parents produce video content for the little ones — and their 30 million subscribers. “At the end of 2020, [Ryan] was the highest paid youtuber in the world according to the magazine Forbes.”
The recipe for this success is based on a fairly basic principle and uses, among other things, vlogs (blog posts in the form of a video) and “pranks” (hoaxes). We can thus watch Ryan unwrap presents or packages of food, before trying the toys or eating the sweets.
After all, who has never felt this tension of expectation, this touch of excitement that grips the opening of a package? A little flash of dopamine. That’s what these ‘kids unboxing’ videos exploit.”
The problem is that these videos encourage consumption. Child spectators identify with their influencer, wish to integrate the group he represents and therefore “do like” him, explains the Swiss daily. Their brain also engages the circuit of the reward at the sight of these objects of pleasure by a process of empathy which awakens the desire to obtain them. This is all the more the case among the youngest, who are more subject to “immediate pleasure”.
disguised advertising
A study released in 2021 measured the consequences of this content on the eating behavior of children. She reveals that these videos would not be perceived as advertising by the majority of the 90 young participants, aged 4 to 13, and that they would stimulate their appetite for carbohydrate-rich foods.
“These videos therefore have the ability to arouse the desire to purchase or consume food, while evading advertising regulations,” continues The weather.
One of the videos of Ryan and his parents has generated over 18 million views. This type of content generates so much traffic that the international platform that is YouTube has no real interest in regulating it. This raises the question of both disguised advertising and child labor, given the number of hours during which they are filmed.
Jérôme Voumard, doctoral student at the Unilaps social psychology laboratory, tempers with the Swiss daily: “There is a lot of this content that does not necessarily have a commercial aim and shows unusual objects. The desire for discovery, the educational dimension should not be neglected.”