Some people say advertising has positive economic effects. Others think it has negative social effects because it will make people dissatisfied with who they are and what they have. Discuss both views and give your own opinion.

Sample Response

1

There have been opposing views about advertisingconcerning advertisements. While some people claim that advertisingit can be beneficial for businesses, others opine that advertising is detrimental to individuals. In my opinion, both views have meritboth ideas are correct to a certain extent.

2

On the one hand, advertising has long been used by business owners as an effective toola great tool to boost sales. Advertisements can raise awareness of new productsgive new products recognition and help educate first-time buyers. This means that it can introduce innovative services that have never existed before to the public, or partly guide clueless consumers who have never purchased a product before on its range and qualities. A prime example of this is Nike’s “Just Do It” campaign. PreviouslyIn the old days, Nike’s products were marketed mainly to athletescatered mostly to athletes, but in the late 1980s, Nike launchedcreated this campaign to introduce its shoes to the masses. The effort was successful in helping Nike tap into a new demographic and generating unprecedented profitsand in yielding never-before-seen profits for the brand.

3

On the other hand, advertisements have undeniable negative effects on the human psychehuman’s psyche. Advertising’s core mission is to keep customers informed; however,informed, however, this is a double-edged sword, as it also creates new desiresnew yearnings are also created, preventing people from being satisfied with what they have and encouraging consumerismboosting consumerism culture. As individuals are bombarded with advertisements which state that they need something new to better their life, depreciation of their existing assets will appear. For well-off people, life will become a constant race to possess the next ground-breaking productproducts, while for less fortunate ones, they will may develop feelingsunconsciously suffer from feelings of inferiority due to not having what is considered desirable, as portrayed in advertisementsgood - as stated on advertisements. These are unhealthy modes of living that people should not have to experience.

4

All in all, whether advertising is advantageous or not depends on the perspective considereddepends on the standpoint. For companies, it can help generate greater profitsprovide great assistance to generate more profits, whereas for individuals, advertisements can adversely affect their thinkingaffect their thinking adversely.

Overall assessment

Why this response received Band 7.5

The response handles both viewpoints directly, sustains a clear nuanced opinion, and uses a well-chosen Nike example to develop the economic case. Its main limitation is uneven lexical and grammatical control, with several awkward collocations and agreement or punctuation errors making parts of the social-effects discussion less natural. The highest-priority improvement is to replace imprecise phrases with idiomatic alternatives and edit long sentences for cleaner clause boundaries.

Band score breakdown

IELTS Writing Criteria Scores

TR

Task Response

8.0
Scoring rule

Both views are explored in depth and the response maintains a clear, qualified opinion that is supported throughout.

Next step

Clarify the final judgment slightly by stating more explicitly how the competing economic and social effects should be weighed overall.

CC

Coherence and Cohesion

8.0
Scoring rule

The essay is logically organized into focused paragraphs, and its contrasting lines of argument progress clearly.

Next step

Break up the longest sentence in the social-effects paragraph to make the sequence of consequences easier to follow.

LR

Lexical Resource

7.0
Scoring rule

The response demonstrates good range and some effective precision, but several collocations are awkward or inaccurate.

Next step

Replace phrases such as consumerism culture, better their life, and depreciation of their existing assets with more idiomatic alternatives.

GRA

Grammatical Range and Accuracy

7.0
Scoring rule

A range of complex structures is used successfully, although agreement, possessive, and punctuation errors recur without obscuring meaning.

Next step

Check pronoun agreement and clause boundaries carefully, especially around plural subjects and conjunctive adverbs such as however.

Put the feedback to work

Write this task while it is fresh

Try the same task now. It helps you remember the feedback and write better next time.

IELTS Writing Task 2

Some people say advertising has positive economic effects. Others think it has negative social effects because it will make people dissatisfied with who they are and what they have. Discuss both views and give your own opinion.

Your response

Words0
40:00

Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.