Preventing Childhood Obesity - Evidence Policy and Practice.pdf

Chapter 3
than $10 billion per year on marketing to children.
American children receive an average 65 messages
from television advertising every day (about half are
for food) with numerous additional marketing messages
from websites, schools and in retail stores. 21 For
now, television remains one of the most influential
sources of communication despite the introduction of
other technological advances such as the Internet and
the mobile phone, presently also used for marketing
purposes. 22 Television is both the main electronic
medium with which children engage, 23 and the
primary source of advertising used by the food
industry.
A 1996 a cross - cultural study of children ’ s television
in 13 industrialized countries found that food
advertising accounted for almost half of all advertising
broadcast and represented by far the largest category
of advertisements shown during children ’ s TV viewing
times. 24 The study demonstrated that over half of all
food advertisements were dominated by confectionary,
pre - sweetened breakfast cereals and fast food restaurants.
Savoury snacks, high - sugar dairy products,
ready prepared foods, soft drinks, cakes, biscuits and
desserts were also often advertised in most countries. 19
In America, where most children who are at risk of
becoming obese are African American children 25 from
low-income families,26 African American prime-time
television shows contain 60% more food commercials
(fast food, candy and snacks) compared with general
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prime-time market shows.
The i mpact of f ood m arketing to c hildren
Central to the discussion around the impact of limiting
food advertising to young children is the nature of
children ’ s comprehension of advertising. 28 Food
advertising to young children draws considerable
public concern. Numerous studies have documented
that young children whose advertising literacy is lower
are more susceptible to media effects. 29,30 Prior to age
7 or 8 years, children tend to view advertising as fun
and do not tend to differentiate advertising from programs,
regarding advertising as entertaining, unbiased
information. 29,31
The majority of studies on the effect of television
food advertising on children ’ s food choices were
North American, and took place during in the 1970s
and 1980s. Goldberg ’ s study 32 in Quebec demon-
strated that the more television advertisements a child
sees for sugared cereals, the more likely the product
will be present in the household. Taras et al 32,33 found
that for children aged 4 to 8, weekly television viewing
time was significantly correlated with requests for
specified advertised products as well as overall energy
intake. Borzekowski and Thomas ’ s experiment 34 demonstrated
with 2- to 6-year-old low-income children
that even a brief exposure to food advertisements led
children to choose advertised products more often.
Recently, Hastings et al 35 systematically reviewed
the effects of advertising on food consumption in
children, concluding that food promotion has an
effect on their preferences, purchase behavior and
consumption.
In contrast, Livingstone and Helsper suggest that
the effects of television advertising on young children
’s (2–6-year-olds) food choice are weak, concluding
that young children are no more affected
by advertising than teenagers. They asserted that if
children of all ages, at different stages of advertising
literacy are similarly influenced by advertising, then
this must mask some underlying differences in
persuasion.31 Livingstone and Helsper applied the
Elaboration Likelihood Model of Persuasion, 36 which
holds that the process responsible for advertisement
effectiveness is one of two routes to persuasion. The
first, known as the “ central route ”, involves effortful
cognitive activity, whereby the person focuses their
attention on message relevant information and draws
on prior experience and knowledge to assess and
elaborate on the presented information. The other
mode of persuasion is known as the “ peripheral
route ”, whereby a person does not think much about
message content but they may be still persuaded by
non - content elements (peripheral cues). 37 T h e y
suggest that younger children are more likely to be
persuaded by the peripheral route and teenagers are
more likely to be persuaded by the central route.
Young children, as less media - literate viewers, are
more interested in such peripheral cues such as celebrity
sources, jingles and colorful and entertaining
images.31 As Fischer et al 38 demonstrated, 2 –6-yearolds
can recognize well - known brand names and
associate them with products particularly when brands
use visual cues such as bright color, pictures and
cartoon characters. 39
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