‘Good mother’ advertisements and ‘satisfaction’

Doç. Dr. Sevcan Karakoç Demirkaya

Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist & Psychotherapist

“A table set perfectly for when everyone comes home from work, happy family members and a mother with a warm, smiling gaze offering them a spoonful of yoghurt...” “The pleasure of sneaking a bite of ice cream during a coffee break after a busy meeting...” “Even if we get dirty or climb trees, without a single word of warning, we run and hug our mother and the biscuits she has baked for us...” “Even if we get dirty or climb trees, she never says a word of warning, but runs to hug us, and the biscuits she’s baked waiting for us…”

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Everyone knows that ‘stereotypical cultural identities’ are used as an advertising and marketing strategy and represent the ‘ideal’ of the product’s target audience. To make the product even more memorable and to establish identification and direct consumers towards that product, ‘role models’ that include people embraced by society are also used for social cognitive learning, and sales are made with this illusion.

Erik Erikson proposed that when a baby establishes a fundamental trust relationship with its mother, it moves on to other stages of development with a sense of ego strength and hope for the future. Adequate and regular feeding during this period fosters a positive outlook and plants the seed of hope. During this period, a mother who is attentive to her baby’s signals stays close to her baby and soothes her. The feeling of basic trust is established in these early years.
Margaret Mahler also likened biological birth to psychological birth in the first year of life. When describing the first months, which she called the autistic period and then the symbiotic period, it is during this period that the infant’s physiological needs are met and the infant’s homeostasis is maintained as it opens up to the outside world from the womb. Mahler developed her ‘separation-individuation’ theory using the example of young birds waiting in an egg, the eggshell cracking open, the young birds emerging, and then waiting in the nest for a period of time.
The mother protects her infant by providing warmth during the autistic period, when the infant is not yet aware of her. Then, in the second month, the symbiotic (shared life) period begins, during which the infant feels united with the mother and feels powerful. The mother and infant are fused, and the infant fulfils all its needs through the mother. Over time, boundaries become apparent, and the infant becomes aware of the distinction between ‘self’ and ‘other’.
Attachment theory states that the relationship between mother and baby is not merely one of need fulfilment, but involves mutual emotional regulation. It emphasises that the mother serves as a ‘secure base,’ and that the attachment pattern formed during the first year of life is a process that shapes how people perceive the world and form relationships in the future.
Donald Winnicott, an object relations theorist, proposed that it is not possible for the mother to meet every need and satisfy every demand, and that tolerable and temporary deprivations and deficiencies may occur for the child to grow and mature. He coined the term ‘good enough mother’.

Most theorists who focus on the first year of life discuss developmental stages shaped by feeding during infancy. In this context, ‘eating’ can also be a means of satisfaction. The interaction with the caregiver during this process, which begins entirely with the body’s balance and physiology in the early stages, is reflected in eating attitudes in later life, both in internal and external conflicts experienced by individuals. The act of eating or not eating, as the only point of control in life and a stress-relieving behaviour, continues throughout life. Eating is a way to satisfy emotional hunger. Advertisements target foods that will compensate for the lack of a ‘good mother’ in individuals. On the other hand, foods also represent the person’s desires in line with their values. Just as sugar advertisements are appealing to young children, diet products are more readily available to those dissatisfied with their bodies or who value their appearance, delicatessen products to those of a higher socio-economic status, and local products belonging to that culture to more traditional groups.
Another important point is that the vast majority of advertisements for food products feature women, particularly women in the role of motherhood. While eating provides the individual with both real and metaphorical satisfaction, feeding (cooking, preparing, serving) also presents another lost object. The individual’s missing object is the fantasy of bonding with the mother who perhaps did not ‘feed’ them enough (did not care for them, did not embrace them, did not look after them, did not include them) in the early mother-child relationship, which is presented in advertisements.

All these methods make advertisements appealing and have been attempting to ‘satisfy’ people for years. They continue to manipulate individuals who are unaware of their false selves by presenting them with ‘false needs’. Particularly in food advertisements, the main theme is shaped not by “necessity” but by ‘wanting-desiring’. In this situation, individuals manage the current crises pathologically through hoarding (storing products in excess of their needs) and emotional eating binges. They take comfort in the good mother of advertising… So, the final word: even though we have regressed during the pandemic, let the show go on… until we are satisfied.