Food and Beverage Marketing to Children and Adolescents: What Changes are Needed to Promote Healthy Eating Habits?
Although many factors influence whether a child or adolescent is at risk for obesity, marketing has an especially powerful impact on the foods and beverages we consume, a new research brief from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation finds. Released as part of RWJF's Healthy Eating Research program, Food and Beverage Marketing to Children and Adolescents: What Changes Are Needed to Promote Healthy Eating Habits? (12 pages, PDF) notes that 98 percent of food advertisements viewed by children and 89 percent of advertisements viewed by adolescents were for products that were high in fat, sugar, or sodium. The brief also describes national regulations to protect youth from deceptive marketing practices and outlines the moves that some food and beverage companies have made to offer healthier options.
