Dr Maximilian Gerrath speaks to Greatest Hits Radio

Featured in several bulletins on Greatest Hits Radio, Dr Gerrath has spoken about the exploitation of the younger generation by so-called social media influencers.

There are calls from MPs for a new code of conduct for online influencers to crack down on advertising to children.

Dr Maximilian Gerrath commented:

The younger generations definitely get a lot of their information, a lot of their product recommendations etc. from social media, right. And especially for this kind of target audience, influencers are having a lot of power and control over them.

A report from Ofcom titled ‘Children and parents: media use and attitudes report 2020/21’ has revealed that up to half of children surveyed watched content from vloggers and YouTube influencers in 2021.

Comparing his previous experience working at a children’s television station, Dr Gerrath noted:

We had to follow quite heavy guidelines in terms of what kind of advertisements we were allowed to run, and as far as I’m concerned regulations for influencers seem to be very vague.

View Dr Maximilian Gerrath’s profile.

The bulletin is not available to listen to online.