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Empty pledges: a content analysis of Belgian and Dutch child-targeting food websites
Abstract
In the EU Pledge, food and beverage companies voluntarily engage themselves to stop marketing unhealthy foods and beverages to children under age 12. However, children are increasingly exposed to online marketing promoting unhealthy foods and beverages. The main purpose of this paper was to verify whether Belgian and Dutch pledge members’ child-targeting food websites actually comply to the guidelines of the EU Pledge. First, this paper describes the prominence of online marketing on 49 Belgian and Dutch child-targeting food websites and evaluates the nutrient content of the advertised foods and beverages. Second, it checks for the degree to which Belgian and Dutch food brands abide the EU Pledge. Results indicated that about 88.5% of the online-promoted products were unhealthy, whereas marketing features were still present at every website. The nutrient profile of the online-promoted foods and beverages did not differ significantly between pledge and non-pledge members. Only 8.2% of the websites used age blocks, whereas ad-break reminders were completely absent. We conclude that the food and beverage companies do not abide their vows: Children still have unlimited access to websites promoting unhealthy food.
... Marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages to children increases their consumption of less healthful products and fosters a preference for calorie-dense foods with little nutritional value (Sadeghirad et al. 2016). The internet is one medium through which companies can engage child audiences with their products using various marketing techniques, including interactive activities such as games, colouring pages, animations or videos appealing to children, among others (Brady et al. 2010;Potvin Kent et al. 2013;Ustjanauskas et al. 2014;Boelsen-Robinson et al. 2016;Neyens and Smits 2016;Vandevijvere et al. 2017;. As frequent internet users (Steeves 2014), children in Canada are vulnerable to food marketing on websites and the health consequences associated with consuming these products (Sadeghirad et al. 2016). ...
... This proposal is supported by our results, which indicate that approximately one-third of the largest food companies in Canada are employing a variety of marketing techniques at high frequencies to market products to children on their websites. Consistent with the results of similar content analyses, this study found manufacturer and brand logos, images of product packaging, and brand or product benefit claims to be among the most widely and frequently used techniques for marketing foods to children D r a f t online (Weber et al. 2006;Kelly et al. 2008;Henry and Story 2009;Potvin Kent et al. 2013;Neyens and Smits 2016). Recent studies have also indicated that social sharing buttons are becoming a widely used technique for marketing to children on food company websites (Neyens and Smits 2016;Vandevijvere et al. 2017). ...
... Consistent with the results of similar content analyses, this study found manufacturer and brand logos, images of product packaging, and brand or product benefit claims to be among the most widely and frequently used techniques for marketing foods to children D r a f t online (Weber et al. 2006;Kelly et al. 2008;Henry and Story 2009;Potvin Kent et al. 2013;Neyens and Smits 2016). Recent studies have also indicated that social sharing buttons are becoming a widely used technique for marketing to children on food company websites (Neyens and Smits 2016;Vandevijvere et al. 2017). Featuring social sharing buttons on websites encourages visitors to actively engage with brands and enables companies to reach wider audiences via social media (Tsimonis and Dimitriadis 2014). ...
Marketing unhealthy foods and beverages to children (M2K) fosters poor dietary patterns, increasing obesity and noncommunicable disease risk. Federal restrictions on M2K have been under development in Canada since 2016; however, at present, M2K is mostly self-regulated by food companies. This study aimed to compare M2K on Canadian websites of food companies with and without voluntary policies or commitments in this area. A systematic content analysis of company websites was conducted in spring/summer 2017 for major packaged food (n = 16), beverage (n = 12), and restaurant chain (n = 13) companies in Canada. M2K policies were sourced from company websites and published corporate documents. Sixteen companies (43%) reported national and/or global M2K policies, while 21 companies (57%) had no published policies. The websites of Canadian companies (n = 154) were scanned for child-directed products and marketing; type and frequency of marketing techniques were recorded. Child-directed marketing appeared on 19 websites of 12 companies (32%), including 9 companies with M2K policies. Websites featured products with unconventional flavours, colours, shapes, or child-oriented packaging, and used promotional characters, contests, games, activities, or lettering and graphics appealing to children. The nutritional quality of products marketed to children was evaluated using a nutrient profile model developed by Health Canada for proposed M2K regulations. Of the 217 products marketed to children, 97% exceeded Health Canada’s proposed ∼5% Daily Value threshold for saturated fat, sodium, and/or sugars, 73% of which were products from 9 companies with policies. These findings highlight the limitations of self-regulation in restricting M2K on food company websites, reinforcing the need for government regulations.
... McCullough, 25 Brindal et al., 51 Dembek et al., 27 Frazier & Harris, 30 Huang & Yang, 31 Ofcom, 35 Ofcom, 36 Otten et al., 43 Potvin Kent et al., 42 Powell et al., 38 Powell et al., 37 Silva et al. 44 5 CS content analysis: Neyens & Smits, 57 Potvin Kent et al., 67 Potvin Kent & Pauze, 50 Théodore et al., 59 Vergeer et al., 60 10 repeated CS content analysis: Campos et al., 26 Effertz & Wilcke, 29 Galloway & Calvert, 52 Kim et al., 32 King et al., 65 King et al., 64 Kunkel et al., 66 Landwehr & Hartmann, 56 Mediano et al., 39 Warren et al. 40 1 CS content analysis and survey: Potvin Kent et al. 49 3 repeated CS content analysis and survey: Dillman Carpentier et al., 28 Hebden et al., 63 Lwin et al, 2020. ...
... and proportion of TV food advertisements viewed by children that were for unhealthy foods reduced, again post versus pre-CFBAI.37 Six studies reported no effects of any food marketing policy, with effect measures of child person-minute views (PMVs) of TV HFSS food advertising in a repeated cross-sectional survey design,24 annual national GRPs for carbonated soft drink advertising also in a repeated crosssectional survey design,25 average number of non-core food TV advertisements per hour on the main free-to-air commercial TV channels in a repeated cross-sectional content analysis,65 unhealthy foods ads as a proportion of all food advertisements around children's TV programs on the most popular channels in repeated cross-sectional content analysis and repeated cross-sectional survey designs, respectively, 42,66 and average nutrition scores of websites of brands commonly marketed to children in a cross-sectional content analysis.57 Eleven studies reported an unclear effect potentially favoring the control, so potentially undesirable effects on exposure. ...
This systematic review examined the effectiveness of policies restricting the marketing of foods and/or non‐alcoholic beverages to children to inform updated World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines. Databases were searched to March 2020. Inclusion criteria were primary studies of any design assessing implemented policies to restrict food marketing to children (0–19 years). Critical outcomes were exposure to and power of marketing, dietary intake, choice, preference, and purchasing. Important outcomes were purchase requests, dental caries, body weight, diet‐related noncommunicable diseases, product change, and unintended consequences. Forty‐four observational studies met inclusion criteria; most were moderate quality. Pooling was conducted using vote counting by direction of effect, and GRADE was used to judge evidence certainty. Evidence suggests food marketing policies may result in reduced purchases of unhealthy foods and in unintended consequences favorable for public health. Desirable or potentially desirable (for public health) effects of policies on food marketing exposure and power were also found. Evidence on diet and product change was very limited. The certainty of evidence was very low for four outcomes (exposure, power, dietary intake, and product change) and low for two (purchasing and unintended consequences). Policies can effectively limit food marketing to children; policymakers should prioritize mandatory approaches aligned with WHO recommendations.
... More specifically, this agreement prohibits the endorsement of foods that do not meet the predefined nutritional criteria on influencer accounts targeting young children. Some argue, however, that the pledge cannot sufficiently protect children from exposure to unhealthy foods (Neyens and Smits, 2017). Social media are still a relatively unregulated space in this regard, and marketers should be held accountable when targeting children with unhealthy products, especially since the negative consequences of marketing unhealthy foods to children are well known (Folkvord et al., 2022). ...
The current study examines how social media influencers can be deployed to promote healthy food choice behavior among tweens. In particular, we investigated whether tweens’ healthy food choice behavior can be stimulated by using a thin-ideal influencer in a sponsored influencer post promoting unhealthy vs. healthy food. A two-by-two, between-subjects experimental study (influencer weight: thin-ideal vs. overweight; snack-type: unhealthy vs. healthy) was conducted with 146 tweens (11–13 years old, 73 boys). Results show that tweens’ choice for a healthy snack was higher when a (female) overweight influencer promoted an unhealthy snack (compared to a healthy snack). Using a thin-ideal influencer promoting an unhealthy vs. healthy snack did not affect tweens’ healthy food choices. While there were no interaction effects of influencer weight and snack type on source effects (influencer credibility, influencer admiration, and trans-parasocial interactions), the results did show that the influencer was perceived as less credible and was admired less when she was overweight vs. when she had a thin-ideal body-type.
... Apart from popular food endorsers who spread misleading health claims, also food marketers frequently use misleading advertising to promote food products, which creates tensions in interactions with public health professionals. Despite many food companies committed to partnerships with health charities and health sector organizations to enhance their corporations' credibility (Freedhoff & Hébert, 2011;Tempels et al., 2017), the nutrition and health claims legislation (European Commission, 2007) and the EU Pledge commitments (EU Pledge, 2013), many food companies continue to promote foods high in sugar, fat and salt, with success, also towards children (Boyland & Whalen, 2015;Neyens & Smits, 2017). ...
There is an abundance of messages on food and health communicated nowadays by diverse stakeholders, including nutrition and health experts, food industries, celebrity chefs, and food influencers, among others. If each of these stakeholders has different interests and uses other communication strategies, confusion and polarization about food and health is likely to arise. Especially when these messages not only represent facts, but many are emotionally loaded, focusing on “beliefs”. Yet even when stakeholders contradict each other in their communication about food related to health, they influence each other. This conceptual paper aims to identify and position the different stakeholders participating in discourse about food and health. Taking a stakeholder marketing perspective in which understanding the whole requires a holistic view, we position the stakeholders as interrelated networks and discuss how their communication strategies influence each other. Stakeholder multiplicity in food communication is often looked at from a negative perspective in terms of conflicting and polarizing voices, however we suggest that this may also take the form of positive, complimentary, and cooperative partnerships. We argue for stakeholders to build complementarities and embrace each one’s unique expertise in order to foster objective messages about food and health. Communication about food and health would be ideally shaped by using the guidelines of nutrition experts, the preparation techniques of (celebrity) chefs, and the successful communication strategies of knowledgeable food influencers. Where many individual players nowadays aim to fulfill all of these expert roles, we urge for more cooperation among different stakeholders’ unique expertise, without entirely having to forego each individual interest. Strengthening cooperation and improving communication requires an approach that brings the diverse stakeholders in a meaningful way together around the same table.
... To date, most studies seeking to assess the nature and extent of food marketing to children on the internet have been limited to measuring either paid advertising on third-party websites [42] or owned media, including food company websites [43,44] or social media pages [45]. These studies are useful for capturing the range of techniques used by food companies and the techniques that generate the greatest overall user engagement. ...
Background
Food is one of the most frequently promoted commodities, and promoted foods are overwhelmingly unhealthy. Marketing normalizes unhealthy foods, creates a positive brand image, and encourages overconsumption. Limited research is available to describe the extent of food marketing to children on web-based media, and measuring actual exposure is challenging.
Objective
This study aims to monitor the extent of children’s exposure to web-based media food marketing as an essential step in increasing the accountability of industry and governments to protect children.
Methods
Children aged 13-17 years were recruited from October 2018 to March 2019. Children recorded their mobile device screen for 2 weekdays and 1 weekend day any time they visited relevant web-based platforms. After each day, the participants uploaded the video files to a secure server. Promoted products were defined using the World Health Organization European Region nutrient profile model.
Results
The sample of 95 children uploaded 267.8 hours of video data. Children saw a median of 17.4 food promotions each hour on the internet. Considering the usual time spent on the internet on mobile devices, children would be exposed to a median of 168.4 food promotions on the web on mobile devices per week, 99.5 of which would not be permitted to be marketed based on nutrient profiling criteria. Most promotions (2613/4446, 58.77%) were peer endorsed and derived from third-party sources.
Conclusions
Exposure to brand content that is seemingly endorsed by peers or web-based communities likely heightens the effects of marketing on children. Regulations to protect children from this marketing must extend beyond paid advertising to paid content in posts generated through web-based communities and influencers.
... 68 Other studies that have examined the effectiveness of "self-regulatory" strategies on food advertising to children younger than the age of 12 years have had similar findings. Such strategies include the European Union Pledge in Belgium and the Netherlands, where approximately 88.5% of signatory companies provided unhealthy food advertisement to children 69 and the CAI in the United States for which only 1 of every 45 brand exposures was a "healthful message." 70 The failure of self-regulatory mechanisms to reduce children's exposure to online advertisements for unhealthy foods indicates that mandatory regulations on digital advertising to children are needed. ...
Children today are exposed to multiple forms of digital media including traditional (e.g., televisions, computers) and newer mobile devices (e.g., smartphones, tablets, etc.). As the digital media environment evolves, it is important that health care providers and policymakers adapt to develop, implement and evaluate strategies to ameliorate its effects on health. This paper provides an overview of the literature on the relationship between the digital media environment and cardiovascular risk factors in childhood. Existing evidence on the relationship between digital media environment and cardiovascular risk in infants, children, and youth are reported. Potential mechanisms underpinning the relationship between the digital media environment and cardiovascular disease risk in children such as the displacement of movement behaviours, food and beverage marketing to children, and eating while viewing were explored. National and international guidelines aimed at addressing the digital media environment are highlighted, and suggestions for future research and guideline development are provided. Action-oriented professional recommendations for health care providers, families, and children are urgently needed. As the prevalence of screen use in childhood continues to exceed those of past generations, concern about the effects and strategies to reduce harm including cardiovascular outcomes must remain a top public health priority.
... An annual report is produced independently by an audit company, Accenture and all reports state that the brands have complied with the standards of EU Pledge either in traditional advertising or on their websites. However, research from Neyens and Smits (2016), which analyzed 49 Belgian and Dutch child-targeting food websites, concluded that 88.5 per cent of the onlinepromoted products were unhealthy, despite the fact of the EU Pledge report of 2015 stating that only seven of the 219 websites were found to be non-compliant (EU Pledge Monitoring Report, 2015). Some research has investigated how we can introduce cues for brand disclosure in the digital arena, to activate the digital literacy skills and counteract the effects of the digital marketing. ...
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to understand the magnitude of the impact advergames have on children’s preferences and choices for unhealthy products and brands, in terms of time of exposure (immediate vs delayed) and number of exposures (single vs repeated exposure). Past literature has focused essentially on the immediate effects of single exposures to advergames. Few studies explored the delayed or repetition effects and found wear-out effects of multiple exposure and also no delayed effects of single exposure. Therefore, this study will reduce the existent gap in the literature by studying simultaneously both effects.
Design/methodology/approach
A sample of 104 children aged 6-9 years old was used, divided into three groups (no exposure/single exposure/repeated exposure) in an experimental between-subjects design setting.
Findings
The results confirm the existence of all the expected effects: exposure to advergames has immediate and longer effects on a child’s preferences and choices of the brand depicted in the advergame and in that product category. Repeated exposure to the advergame enhances all the effects on the brand, but not on the product category.
Originality/value
Although earlier literature has already analyzed time and repetition effects on traditional media, or sought to analyze effects of advergames but with an adult sample, this article highlights the extent of these effects with children, and based on these results, reflects on the ethicality of using advergames with children on products high in fat, salt and/or sugar.
... Therefore, if TV advertisements advertise mainly unhealthy foods, audiences who are exposed to these advertisements might crave and consume more of these foods. In response to the accumulating evidence on the effect of exposure to unhealthy foods through TV advertisements (Cairns et al., 2013), the EU (2015) instituted a pledge regulating food and beverage advertising to children under the age of 12. Nevertheless, a recent study has shown that European children are still exposed to unhealthy foods via online advertising (Neyens and Smits, 2016) and perhaps even TV cooking shows. ...
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to analyse the nutritional content of recipes prepared in popular children’s television (TV) cooking shows.
Design/methodology/approach
A cross-sectional analysis of 150 recipes focusing on calorie, total fat and carbohydrates, saturated fatty acids, fibre, sugar, protein and salt content was performed. Main course recipes were evaluated against the UK Food Standards Agency (FSA), and the proportions of energy derived from each nutrient were evaluated against the World Health Organization (WHO) recommendations.
Findings
While a significant proportion met the FSA and WHO recommendations for energy and salt, 58 per cent were above the FSA recommendation for total fat ( χ ² =5.598, p =0.01), 56 per cent failed to meet the recommendations for saturated fatty acids ( χ ² =4.551, p =0.03) and 60 per cent exceeded the FSA protein recommendations ( χ ² =12.602, p <0.001). Only 17 and 21 per cent of the recipes met the minimum recommendations for carbohydrates ( χ ² =30.429, p <0.001) and fibre ( χ ² =16.909, p <0.001), respectively. Only 37 per cent had adequate portion of fruits and vegetables. The nutritional content varied depending on the composition of the recipes; vegetarian recipes were more likely to meet the recommendations than poultry, meat or fish recipes.
Research limitations/implications
Foods displayed by children’s popular TV cooking show fall short of the standards for healthy eating, thus warranting further research on how these shows affect eating behaviour.
Originality/value
This study is the first to consider children’s TV cooking shows as a platform of exposure to unhealthy foods.
... Research on food marketing demonstrated its preponderance 24 towards unhealthy foods (Schwartz et al., 2013). This has been demonstrated in mainstream 25 media such as TV (e.g., Boyland et al., 2011) and the Internet (Alvy and Calvert, 2008;26 Neyens and Smits, 2016). However, a frequently used but often underestimated technique 27 pertains to food packaging, a marketing medium that is able to persuade both pre-and post-28 purchase. ...
Persuasive on-pack marketing strategies, such as colourful images and games, affect children’s preferences and requests. The purpose of this study was to describe the prevalence of these child-directed (i.e., aimed at children) strategies on food packages at a Belgian retailer. Although previous research already demonstrated the frequency of most of these techniques directed at children, this paper extends to food pricing and facing strategies (i.e., the number of items from the same product aligned next to each other in the supermarket shelves) which were unstudied till now. Moreover, the association between the use of these strategies, the products’ (un)healthiness and their type of brand (national vs. private) is investigated. The content analysis found that 372 food products contained one or more child-directed marketing strategies on–pack, all these communications were coded; the products could be classified in 15 food categories. On average, 3.9 (Min = 1; Max = 8) food promotion techniques were used per package. Unhealthiness of products was rated according to Food Standards Agency (FSA) Nutrient Profile UK. We found that 89.2% of all products with child-directed strategies were considered to be unhealthy. The presence of marketing strategies was associated with higher product unhealthiness, but did not differ much between types of brand. Overall, these findings suggest that (unhealthy) foods aimed at children typically feature many on-pack persuasive communications, which implies that policy makers should (continue to) monitor this. These findings highlight the need for further research to investigate the impact of on-pack communications on children's consumption.
... Industry self-regulation has led to vows on restricting advertising for unhealthy foods (see WHO, 2013), but not to a restriction of the number of advertisements that may be included on children's websites. A study by Neyens and Smits (2016) demonstrated that despite the self-regulatory EU Pledge, food websites tend to use numerous marketing cues, even when marketing unhealthy foods. A content analysis by Cai and Zhao (2013) showed that two-thirds of children's websites contain banners. ...
For decades, child-directed advertising has been the subject of debate and research. In addition to advertising on traditional media, children are increasingly exposed to sophisticated forms of advertising on new media (Calvert, 2008; WHO, 2016). Advertising not only affects children’s cognitions, attitudes, and behaviors towards brands and products, but – according to Kasser and Linn (2016) – also “harms” them by triggering “a materialistic value orientation, unhealthy eating, distorted body image, aggressive behavior, and substance use” (p. 132).
... Food advertising directed to children mainly includes snacks and fast food that are preferred because of their sweetness and next to containing sugar the consumption of these products also regularly exceeds the daily recommended amounts of fat and salt (Botha et al., 2008;Lodolce, Harris, & Schwartz, 2013). The marketing of these unhealthy foods to children presents significant public health risk and is known to be an important factor that could cause childhood obesity (EU Pledge, 2015;Neyens & Smits, 2016;Persson, Soroko, Musicus, & Lobstein, 2012;WHO, 2012). In recent years, marketers have increased their use of nontraditional media and marketing opportunities to reach young consumers. ...
Adults consume more from large packages and portions than from smaller ones. Food intake increases with larger packages, which may be due to larger consumption norms. Even when foods are non-palatable, large containers can lead to overeating. However, these potential effects and how they depend on the food type have not been tested among young children. We conducted two experiments in a controlled environment. In a first study, which is a conceptual replication of Wansink and Kim (2005), we presented children (age 6–7) with either regular (30 g) or larger (60 g) cups of salted or sugared popcorn while watching a movie. In the second study we wanted to replicate the findings of the first study, but used a less palatable food type (baby carrots) or a more palatable one (ladyfinger cookies) instead of the sugared versus salted popcorn. Children between 3 and 6 years received the snacks in either regular or large packages during breaks at school. Consumption was measured by subtracting the individual package's post-snack weight from its pre-snack weight. In both studies we found that young children ate more from large packages compared to regular packages and they ate more of the sugared food compared to the less tasty one. Furthermore, the package size effect was stronger for sugared foods in both experiments. Our results have important implications for snack producers, package designers, and policy makers.
Background
Dietary factors are among the largest and costliest drivers of chronic diseases in England. As a response, the government implements a range of population interventions to promote healthy diets by targeting food environments.
Objectives
This study aimed to conduct a systematic review of the effectiveness, cost-effectiveness and policy process of real-world evaluations of national and state policies on improving food environments, with a focus on whether they were regulatory, voluntary or partnership approaches.
Data sources
Fourteen relevant English-language databases were searched in November 2020 for studies published between 2010 and 2020.
Methods
Six separate evidence reviews were conducted to assess the evidence of effectiveness, cost-effectiveness and policy processes of policies to improve food environments.
Results
A total of 483 primary research evaluations and 14 evidence syntheses were included. The study reveals considerable geographic, methodological and other imbalances across the literature, with, for example, 81% of publications focusing only on 12 countries. The systematic reviews also reveal the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of reviewed regulatory approaches designed to improve health, consumer behaviour and food environment outcomes while public–private partnerships and voluntary approaches to improve diets via reformulation, advertising and promotion restrictions or other changes to the environment were limited in their effectiveness and cost-effectiveness. The study also revealed key enabling and impeding factors across regulatory, voluntary and public–private partnership approaches.
Conclusion
From the available evidence reviewed, this study finds that regulatory approaches appear most effective at improving the food environment, and voluntary agreements and partnerships have limited effectiveness. These findings should be carefully considered in future public health policy development, as should the findings of geographic imbalance in the evidence and inadequate representation of equity dimensions across the policy evaluations. We find that food policies are at times driven by factors other than the evidence and shaped by compromise and pragmatism. Food policy should be first and foremost designed and driven by the evidence of greatest effectiveness to improve food environments for healthier diets.
Limitations
This was a complex evidence synthesis due to its scope and some policy evaluations may have been missed as the literature searches did not include specific policy names. The literature was limited to studies published in English from 2010 to 2020, potentially missing studies of interest.
Future work
Priorities include the need for guidance for appraising risk of bias and quality of non-clinical studies, for reporting policy characteristics in evaluations, for supporting evaluations of real-world policies equitably across geographic regions, for capturing equity dimensions in policy evaluations, and for guideline development for quality and risk of bias of policy evaluations.
Study registration
This study is registered as PROSPERO CRD42020170963.
Funding
This award project was funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Public Health Research programme (NIHR award ref: NIHR128607) and is published in full in Public Health Research ; Vol. 12, No. 8. See the NIHR Funding and Awards website for further award information.
This study aims to review digital advertising literature, to identify and define different aspects of ‘digital advertising' role in consumers' behavior. Researchers investigated the role of digital advertising on consumers' behavior while online shopping, exposed to digital ads. Research showed that although new digital advertising legislation, rules, regulations, and self-regulations by voluntary initiatives came into force, it could not stop unethical practices in digital advertising. Mainly, due to controlling difficulties in digital world and advised policy makers and governmental bodies to develop new control techniques and applications of digital ads control along with supporting media literacy and family education about effects of digital ads. In conclusion, as the digital world is constantly changing, policy makers and governments must adopt to changes, and must revise legislation and using new controlling techniques without delay. Developing countries must also implement related protective rules of digital advertising and changes which are in force in developed countries.
Children continue to be exposed to powerful food marketing, which predominantly promotes foods high in saturated fatty acids, trans-fatty acids, free sugars and/or sodium and uses a wide variety of marketing strategies that are likely to appeal to children. Food marketing has a harmful impact on children’s food choice and their dietary intake, affects their purchase requests to adults for marketed foods and influences the development of their norms about food consumption. Food marketing is also increasingly recognized as a children’s rights concern, given its negative impact on several of the rights enshrined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
This WHO guideline provides Member States with recommendations and implementation considerations on policies to protect children from the harmful impact of food marketing, based on evidence specific to children and to the context of food marketing.
Food environments are directly linked to diets and health outcomes such as overweight, obesity, and noncommunicable diseases. The digitalization of food environments is becoming a central issue in public health, yet little is known about this emerging field. We performed a systematic scoping review to map the research on the digital food environment and investigate how the eight dimensions of the food environment, according to an established framework (availability, prices, vendor and product properties, marketing and regulation, accessibility, affordability, convenience, and desirability), might be shifting in the context of a digital society. We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, Scopus, and Web of Science for studies published between 2000 and 2019, using search terms covering digital technology and food environment, which yielded 13,580 unique records. Our analysis of 357 studies shows that digitalization is taking place in all dimensions of the food environment, and enabling the emergence of new forms of buying and selling food, such as online grocery shopping and online food delivery, which may be changing availability of foods and affecting the physical distance to shops and time allocated for shopping. Systematic reviews identified indicated that digital food marketing and social media can influence food choices, preferences and consumption. Our findings suggest that digital and physical food environments are interconnected and influencing one another, but the impact of the digital on health and nutrition is yet unclear.
Purpose of Review
This scoping review examines literature from the past 5 years (June 2014 to June 2019) across three databases (PubMed, MEDLINE, and Scopus) to detail how the persuasive power of child-targeted food marketing content is addressed and evaluated in current research, to document trends and gaps in research, and to identify opportunities for future focus.
Recent Findings
Eighty relevant studies were identified, with varied approaches related to examining food marketing techniques to children (i.e., experimental, survey, meta-analyses, mixed methods, content analyses, focus groups). Few studies specifically defined power, and studies differed in terms of techniques examined. Spokes-characters were the predominant marketing technique measured; television was the platform most analyzed; and dominant messages focused on health/nutrition, taste appeals, and appeals to fun/pleasure.
Summary
Mapping the current landscape when it comes to the power of food marketing to children reveals concrete details about particular platforms, methods, and strategies, as well as opportunities for future research—particularly with respect to definitions and techniques monitored, digital platforms, qualitative research, and tracking changes in targeted marketing techniques over time.
Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to investigate the content of food advergames and the nutritional quality of foods promoted in those advergames with the presence of child visitors.
Design/methodology/approach
– This study integrates three different sources of data, first, characteristics of the audience from internet audience measurement metrics; second, an analysis of food advergame content; and third, an analysis of the dietary quality of the foods in advergames.
Findings
– The results show that 83.2 percent of the total 143 advergames are sponsored by CFBAI participating companies and 79.5 percent of the total 44 advergames reaching children are sponsored by those companies. About 87 percent of the advergames reaching children do not include age limit specification. By contrast, about 71 percent of the advergames reaching children include ad breaks and about half of the advergames reaching children include healthy lifestyle information. Compared to the total, advergames reaching children seem to have a higher level of brand integration. Moreover, most foods that the advergames promote are classified as unhealthy. Finally, the results show that ad breaks and number of brand identifiers are the two significant predictors of food advergames with child unique visitors.
Originality/value
– Despite the increased attention to and scrutiny of innovative and interactive food marketing targeting children, little is known about the extent to which such techniques actually reach children, nor about the content and nutritional quality of foods they promote. This study attempts to fill in the gap by focussing on food advergames.
Marketing and advertising support the U.S. economy by promoting the sale of goods and services to consumers, both adults and children. Sandra Calvert addresses product marketing to children and shows that although marketers have targeted children for decades, two recent trends have increased their interest in child consumers. First, both the discretionary income of children and their power to influence parent purchases have increased over time. Second, as the enormous increase in the number of available television channels has led to smaller audiences for each channel, digital interactive technologies have simultaneously opened new routes to narrow cast to children, thereby creating a growing media space just for children and children's products. Calvert explains that paid advertising to children primarily involves television spots that feature toys and food products, most of which are high in fat and sugar and low in nutritional value. Newer marketing approaches have led to online advertising and to so-called stealth marketing techniques, such as embedding products in the program content in films, online, and in video games. All these marketing strategies, says Calvert, make children younger than eight especially vulnerable because they lack the cognitive skills to understand the persuasive intent of television and online advertisements. The new stealth techniques can also undermine the consumer defenses even of older children and adolescents. Calvert explains that government regulations implemented by the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission provide some protection for children from advertising and marketing practices. Regulators exert more control over content on scarce television airwaves that belong to the public than over content on the more open online spaces. Overall, Calvert concludes, children live and grow up in a highly sophisticated marketing environment that influences their preferences and behaviors.
To examine how advergames, which are online computer games developed to market a product, affect consumption of healthier and less healthy snacks by low-income African American children.
Cross-sectional, between-subjects examination of an advergame in which children were rewarded for having their computer character consume healthier or less healthy foods and beverages. Children were randomly assigned to 1 of the following 3 conditions: (1) the healthier advergame condition, (2) the less healthy advergame condition, or (3) the control condition.
Urban public elementary schools.
Thirty low-income, African American children aged 9 to 10 years. Main Exposure Children in the treatment conditions played a less healthy or a healthier version of an advergame 2 times before choosing and eating a snack and completing the experimental measures. Children in the control group chose and ate a snack before playing the game and completing the measures.
The number of healthier snack items children selected and ate and how much children liked the game.
Children who played the healthier version of the advergame selected and ate significantly more healthy snacks than did those who played the less healthy version. Children reported liking the advergame.
Findings suggest that concerns about online advergames that market unhealthy foods are justified. However, advergames may also be used to promote healthier foods and beverages. This kind of social marketing approach could tip the scales toward the selection of higher-quality snacks, thereby helping to curb the obesity epidemic.
Background
Food and beverage marketing has been implicated in the childhood obesity “pandemic.” Prior studies have established the negative impact of television advertising on children's dietary intake, yet few have considered the role of online food and beverage marketing, particularly within the Canadian context.
Objective
This study explores children's engagement in online marketing and investigates the potential impact on their dietary intake.
Methods
Participants were recruited from the Ryerson University Summer Day Camp to participate in a single one-on-one semi-structured interview.
Results
A total of 83 children (age 7 to 13 years; mean 9.99 years; 56.3% boys, 43.8% girls) participated in the study. Fewer children thought that there is food, drink, or candy advertising on the internet (67.7%) than on television (98.8%) (p > 0.001). Awareness of online marketing increased with age: 7 to 8 year olds (23.67%; 4), 9 to 10 years (63.89%; 23), 11 to 12 years (86.96%; 20); 13 years (100%; 9). Over one-third of children had visited a website after seeing the address advertised on television (n = 32; 38.55%) or on product package (n = 29; 34.94%).
Conclusions
Branded internet sites, commonly featured on television and product packaging, offer new opportunities for marketers to reach children with messages promoting commercial food and beverage items. These websites are subsequently spread via word-of-mouth through children's peer networks. The independent impact of web-based food, drink and candy marketing, as well as the synergistic effect of multi-channel product promotion, on children's dietary intake merits further investigation.
This article describes a policy-driven project Marketing of unhealthy food directed to children, which represents the first extensive study of food and beverage advertising and marketing to children in Sweden. The project mapped out food and beverage advertisements directed to Swedish children to provide policymakers with current data about marketing trends to inform the debate concerning the regulation of food advertising in response to childhood obesity. The nature, number and placement of advertisements on television and in the internet that encourage children to buy food and beverages were surveyed during one week in 2005 and 2007. The article summarizes the TV and Internet study results, stakeholder views and public opinion, and discusses the policy implications of digital media and the marketing of unhealthy food and beverages to Swedish children.
When people complain, government agencies often respond. When regulations are threatened, businesses often offer reassurances that the problems can be handled with a self-regulation code. However, past analyses of the power of self-regulation find that while companies' voluntary adherence to self-defined guidelines may effect some change in the activities of some companies, the inherent limitations of self-regulation in the United States may restrict its ability to actually halt or control the undesired practices of others. The recent response by major food manufacturers and marketers to criticism of online games is an example of this mix.
The purpose of this paper is to provide a contribution towards increasing knowledge on how healthy food stimuli can improve eating behaviour, by making a comparison between advergames’ food content effects on children’s food choices, product liking and nutritional knowledge.
A sample of 231 elementary‐school‐age children (7 and 8 years old) was randomly assigned to one of the following tasks: (i) playing the healthy advergame and (ii) playing the less healthy advergame. A post‐treatment pictured questionnaire was used to assess children’s behaviour in terms of immediate food choice, food liking and nutritional knowledge, following exposure to treatment. Results show that children tend to choose according to what was being advertised in the game. In terms of food liking, children who played the less healthy version of the game report a higher preference for some of the less healthy options. Regarding children’s nutritional knowledge, no differences between groups were registered, indicating that children already have a solid understanding of what are ‘good’ and ‘bad’ foods for their health. Our findings are aligned with previous research on dual‐process model: although children’s nutritional knowledge is good, they might not employ it when selecting snacks. According to these results, legal, educational and management contributions should be employed: regulation should protect children from less healthy contents on advergames; schools may use digital games to promote healthier eating habits; enterprises can invest on this market opportunity (healthy food targeting children); and finally, social marketing can use advergames in order to reduce child obesity.
The integrated and highly involving nature of advergames has led to criticism and concern among academics and caretakers. It is assumed that children are highly susceptible to persuasion via advergames, but empirical evidence is scarce. Therefore, this study examined the effects of three factors typically associated with advergames: brand prominence, game involvement, and (limited) persuasion knowledge on cognitive and affective responses. An experiment among 7 to 12year old children (N=105) showed that brand prominence and game involvement influenced children's responses, while persuasion knowledge did not. Brand prominence led to increased brand recall and recognition, whereas game involvement led to more positive brand attitudes. The effect of game involvement was mediated by game attitude, indicating that children are susceptible to affective mechanisms induced by the game. Crucially, our results demonstrate that brand prominence evokes cognitive responses, while game involvement leads to affective responses. Finally, our study revealed that persuasion knowledge (i.e. knowledge of the commercial source of the game and its persuasive intent) did not influence cognitive or affective responses to the brand or game. This implies that even if children understand the game's commercial and persuasive nature, they do not use this knowledge as a defense against the advergame's effects. This study has important theoretical and practical implications regarding the influence of new marketing techniques on children.
The alarming increase in childhood obesity has captured the attention of a broad set of citizens and institutions, with calls for action becoming increasingly powerful. Particular questions are being raised about the impacts of food marketing on children. The Internet has become an important marketing communications tool and is being used by advertisers to target children. This has prompted calls for a review of online marketing practices from public health officials, policy makers, consumer advocates, and industry groups. The objectives of this study are to inform decision makers about the nature of online marketing to children and to identify practices that may raise policy concerns. The authors report results of the first systematic content analysis of food marketers' Web sites that either target children directly or contain content of interest to them. The authors identify 11 online marketing practices of public policy relevance. They discuss the empirical findings in terms of these issues and outline research needs.
This study tested one currently used advertising break for an advergame to see whether its presence helped children recognize the promotional nature of the advergame and mitigated the effects of advertising within the game. With the Persuasion Knowledge Model (PKM) as the theoretical frame, the experiment required that 112 children, aged 8 to 11, play an advergame in which visual and/or audio formats of the ad break were present or absent. Results showed that none of the ad breaks helped children to clearly detect the commercial nature of the game. Also, the presence of the ad break was not linked to children's correct identification of the persuasive agent. The ad break did mitigate advertising effects on children, however, evidenced by decreased desire for and memory of the advertised product.
A sample (n = 295) of five- to eight-year-old children participated in an experiment, which included a control group, where the treatment group played a Froot Loops cereal advergame that made a superiority claim for the cereal compared to fresh fruit. Measures of their responses to the brand featured, as well as their level of persuasion knowledge, were collected. Although the treatment group failed to believe Froot Loops were healthier than fruit, the older children in the group reported significantly higher preference for the brand over other cereals and other food types. No differences in intentions to request the cereal were found. Children's preferences for the Froot Loops brand were not associated with their persuasion knowledge about the advergame.
Abstract This paper takes up the,social and theoretical implications,surrounding ,the ,information management,practices ,found ,within ,children’s online entertainment sites. Although the increasing integration,of information ,and ,data ,gathering systems,is oriented ,towards ,enhancing organizational,efficiency and ,consumer ,service provisions, explicating the administration of online gaming,community ,information ,infrastructures reveals,the ,threats ,of "digital ,redlining" or "weblining.” Empirical data from ,ongoing ,case studies of popular ,children’s game ,sites are presented to reflect on discourses of privacy, data protection,and ,the ethical dimensions ,of data mining. These issues are seen as especially relevant inview,of the ,recent implementation ,of national privacy legislation which apply to children’s online culture. Child users are not only highly targeted by data mining and market research practices but also disadvantaged,by a ,limited awareness ,of the legal and ethical implications of their online interactions with commercial,spaces.
To identify food and beverage brand Web sites featuring designated children's areas, assess marketing techniques present on those industry Web sites, and determine nutritional quality of branded food items marketed to children.
Systematic content analysis of food and beverage brand Web sites and nutrient analysis of food and beverages advertised on these Web sites.
The World Wide Web.
One-hundred thirty Internet Web sites of food and beverage brands with top media expenditures based on the America's Top 2000 Brands section of Brandweek magazine's annual "Superbrands" report.
A standardized content analysis rating form to determine marketing techniques used on the food and beverage brand Web sites. Nutritional analysis of food brands was conducted.
Of 130 Web sites analyzed, 48% featured designated children's areas. These Web sites featured a variety of Internet marketing techniques, including advergaming on 85% of the Web sites and interactive programs on 92% of the Web sites. Branded spokescharacters and tie-ins to other products were featured on the majority of the Web sites, as well. Few food brands (13%) with Web sites that market to children met the nutrition criteria set by the National Alliance for Nutrition and Activity.
Nearly half of branded Web sites analyzed used designated children's areas to market food and beverages to children, 87% of which were of low nutritional quality. Nutrition professionals should advocate the use of advertising techniques to encourage healthful food choices for children.
Americans are spending an increasing amount of time using "new media" like the Internet. There has been little research examining food and beverage Web sites' content and marketing practices, especially those that attract children and adolescents. The purpose of this study was to conduct a content analysis of food- and beverage-brand Web sites and the marketing techniques and advertising strategies present on these sites. The top five brands in eight food and beverage categories, 40 brands in total, were selected based on annual sales data from Brandweek magazine's annual "Superbrands" report. Data were collected using a standardized coding form. The results show a wide variety of Internet marketing techniques and advertising strategies targeting children and adolescents. "Advergaming" (games in which the advertised product is part of the game) was present on 63% of the Web sites. Half or more of the Web sites used cartoon characters (50%) or spokescharacters (55%), or had a specially designated children's area (58%) with a direct link from the homepage. With interactive media still in its developmental stage, there is a need to develop safeguards for children. Food and nutrition professionals need to advocate for responsible marketing techniques that will support the health of children.
The aim of the present study was to describe the nature and extent of food marketing on popular children's websites and food product websites in Australia.
Food product websites (n 119) and popular children's websites (n 196) were selected based on website traffic data and previous research on frequently marketed food brands. Coding instruments were developed to capture food marketing techniques. All references to food on popular children's websites were also classified as either branded or non-branded and according to food categories.
Websites contained a range of marketing features. On food product websites these marketing features included branded education (79.0% of websites), competitions (33.6%), promotional characters (35.3%), downloadable items (35.3%), branded games (28.6%) and designated children's sections (21.8%). Food references on popular children's websites were strongly skewed towards unhealthy foods (60.8% v. 39.2% healthy food references; P<0.001), with three times more branded food references for unhealthy foods. Branded food references displayed similar marketing features to those identified on food product websites.
Internet food marketing uses a range of techniques to ensure that children are immersed in brand-related information and activities for extended periods, thereby increasing brand familiarity and exposure. The relatively unregulated marketing environment and increasing use of the Internet by children point to the potential increase in food marketing via this medium. Further research is required to investigate the impact of Internet food marketing on children's food preferences and consumption, and regulatory options to protect children.
In 2006 the Institute of Medicine (IOM) concluded that food marketing was a contributor to childhood obesity in the United States. One recommendation of the IOM committee was for research on newer marketing venues, such as Internet Web sites. The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to answer the IOM's call by examining food marketing on popular children's Web sites. Ten Web sites were selected based on market research conducted by KidSay, which identified favorite sites of children aged 8 to 11 years during February 2005. Using a standardized coding form, these sites were examined page by page for the existence, type, and features of food marketing. Web sites were compared using chi2 analyses. Although food marketing was not pervasive on the majority of the sites, seven of the 10 Web sites contained food marketing. The products marketed were primarily candy, cereal, quick serve restaurants, and snacks. Candystand.com, a food product site, contained a significantly greater amount of food marketing than the other popular children's Web sites. Because the foods marketed to children are not consistent with a healthful diet, nutrition professionals should consider joining advocacy groups to pressure industry to reduce online food marketing directed at youth.
To consider the use of systematic methods for categorising foods according to their nutritional quality ('nutrient profiling') as a strategy for promoting public health through better dietary choices.
We describe and discuss several well-developed approaches for categorising foods using nutrient profiling, primarily in the area of food labelling and also with respect to advertising controls. The best approach should be able to summarise and synthesise key nutritional dimensions (such as sugar, fat and salt content, energy density and portion size) in a manner that is easily applied across a variety of products, is understandable to users and can be strictly defined for regulatory purposes.
Schemes that provide relative comparisons within food categories may have limited use, especially for foods that are not easily categorised. Most nutrient-profiling schemes do not clearly identify less-healthy foods, but are used to attract consumers towards products with supposedly better profiles. The scheme used in the UK to underpin the colour-coded 'traffic light' signalling on food labels, and the one used by the UK broadcasting regulator Ofcom to limit advertising to children, together represent the most developed use of nutrient profiling in government policy-making, and may have wider utility.
Nutrient profiling as a method for categorising foods according to nutritional quality is both feasible and practical and can support a number of public health-related initiatives. The development of nutrient profiling is a desirable step in support of strategies to tackle obesity and other non-communicable diseases. A uniform approach to nutrient profiling will help consumers, manufacturers and retailers in Europe.
Childhood obesity is a significant problem that requires innovative solutions. This article suggests that researchers and policy-makers move beyond a scrutiny of junk food and televised advertisements to children to focus on the messages targeted to children in the supermarket. Following a content analysis of fun foods marketed to children, the article (a) outlines why the recoding of "regular" food into "fun food" contributes to the childhood obesity crisis, and (b) suggests how the meaning-making practices of food can be acknowledged in the policy-making process.
Food Marketing to Children and Youth: Threat or Opportunity? Washington, DC: National Academy of Sciences
- Medicine Institute
Institute of Medicine. 2006. Food Marketing to Children and Youth: Threat or Opportunity?
Washington, DC: National Academy of Sciences. Accessed March 1, 2014. http://www.iom.
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Defining and Labelling 'Healthy' and 'Unhealthy' Food. Association for the Study of Obesity -Science and Technology Policy Research
- T Lobstein
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Lobstein, T., and S. Davies. 2007. Defining and Labelling 'Healthy' and 'Unhealthy' Food.
Association for the Study of Obesity -Science and Technology Policy Research. Loughborough:
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Better-for-Who? Revisiting Company Promises on Food Marketing to Children
- A Batada
- M G Wootan
Batada, A., and M. G. Wootan. 2009. Better-for-Who? Revisiting Company Promises on Food
Marketing to Children. Washington, DC: Center for Science in the Public Interest.
EU Kids Online: National Perspectives. London: The London School of Economics and Political Science
- L Haddon
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- Kids Online
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Haddon, L., S. Livingstone, and the EU Kids Online Network. 2012. EU Kids Online: National
Perspectives. London: The London School of Economics and Political Science. http://eprints.
lse.ac.uk/46878/.