Gabe Rinaldi
08-09-2007, 04:45 PM
Interesting article....
Fast food branding makes children prefer happy meals
21:08 06 August 2007
NewScientist.com news service
Roxanne Khamsi
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12431-fast-food-branding-makes-
children-prefer-happy-meals.html
Fast food branding really does make food more appetising to children.
A study has revealed that pre-school kids prefer foods wrapped in
McDonalds packaging over the same snacks wrapped in unmarked
packaging.
The finding gives all the more reason to limit the marketing of fast
foods to youngsters, say the researchers who conducted the study. But
they also add that it suggests that powerful branding could help sell
more nutritious healthy foods to a generation of increasingly
overweight kids.
Dina Borzekowski at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Health in
Baltimore, Maryland, US, and her colleagues asked 63 preschoolers,
aged three to five, to sample two meals, each consisting of a chicken
nugget, a quarter of a hamburger, french fries, two baby carrots and
a small cup of milk.
Although both meals came from a local McDonalds, only one of them
appeared in its original packaging. Researchers presented items from
the other meal in plain wrappers, which lacked the company's
distinctive logo.
In most cases children said they tasted a difference between the two
meals, and they overwhelmingly preferred the McDonalds-branded foods.
Commercial influence
For example, 76 per cent favoured the fries presented in the branded
packaging, compared with 13 per cent who liked the unbranded fries
better. And while 60 per cent of the children preferred the McDonalds-
branded chicken nuggets, only 10 per cent favoured the nuggets
presented in plain wrapping.
"It's no surprise that branding works," says Borzekowski. "What's
interesting about these results is to see how strongly it affects the
three- to five-year-olds."
The study also found that children in homes with more televisions
were more likely to show a preference for the branded meal,
suggesting that fast-food commercials exert a strong influence.
"It just shows how difficult it is for parents to fight the battle
alone," says Kathryn Montgomery, an expert on children and media at
American University in Washington DC.
Experts have estimated that the food and beverage industries spend
more than $10 billion each year to market products to US
children. "They could just as easily use marketing to support parents
in their efforts to feed kids a healthy diet," says Margo Wootan,
director of nutrition policy at the Center for Science in the Public
Interest based in Washington DC.
Healthy alternative
Borzekowski points out that the children in the study were twice as
likely to prefer the McDonalds-branded carrots as the plain-packaged
ones. This suggests that marketing savvy could perhaps convince
youngsters to make healthful choices. Some companies have already
begun experimenting with this tactic by using Mickey Mouse cartoons
to sell sliced fruit and placing Curious George stickers on bananas.
Last month McDonalds announced it would shift its advertising
targeted to children under the age of 13 to focus on the 375-calorie
Happy Meal, which it says meets current dietary standards outlined by
the government.
Nutritionists hope that curbing fast-food television ads will help
reverse the obesity epidemic among youngsters. But new forms of
cellphone and internet marketing mean that adolescents are
increasingly exposed to junk-food ads. "My guess is that the effects
[of ads] might even increase with time," says Thomas Robinson at the
Stanford Prevention Research Center in California, who co-authored
the new study with Borzekowski.
Journal reference: Archives of Pediatrics (vol 161, p792-797)
Fast food branding makes children prefer happy meals
21:08 06 August 2007
NewScientist.com news service
Roxanne Khamsi
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12431-fast-food-branding-makes-
children-prefer-happy-meals.html
Fast food branding really does make food more appetising to children.
A study has revealed that pre-school kids prefer foods wrapped in
McDonalds packaging over the same snacks wrapped in unmarked
packaging.
The finding gives all the more reason to limit the marketing of fast
foods to youngsters, say the researchers who conducted the study. But
they also add that it suggests that powerful branding could help sell
more nutritious healthy foods to a generation of increasingly
overweight kids.
Dina Borzekowski at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Health in
Baltimore, Maryland, US, and her colleagues asked 63 preschoolers,
aged three to five, to sample two meals, each consisting of a chicken
nugget, a quarter of a hamburger, french fries, two baby carrots and
a small cup of milk.
Although both meals came from a local McDonalds, only one of them
appeared in its original packaging. Researchers presented items from
the other meal in plain wrappers, which lacked the company's
distinctive logo.
In most cases children said they tasted a difference between the two
meals, and they overwhelmingly preferred the McDonalds-branded foods.
Commercial influence
For example, 76 per cent favoured the fries presented in the branded
packaging, compared with 13 per cent who liked the unbranded fries
better. And while 60 per cent of the children preferred the McDonalds-
branded chicken nuggets, only 10 per cent favoured the nuggets
presented in plain wrapping.
"It's no surprise that branding works," says Borzekowski. "What's
interesting about these results is to see how strongly it affects the
three- to five-year-olds."
The study also found that children in homes with more televisions
were more likely to show a preference for the branded meal,
suggesting that fast-food commercials exert a strong influence.
"It just shows how difficult it is for parents to fight the battle
alone," says Kathryn Montgomery, an expert on children and media at
American University in Washington DC.
Experts have estimated that the food and beverage industries spend
more than $10 billion each year to market products to US
children. "They could just as easily use marketing to support parents
in their efforts to feed kids a healthy diet," says Margo Wootan,
director of nutrition policy at the Center for Science in the Public
Interest based in Washington DC.
Healthy alternative
Borzekowski points out that the children in the study were twice as
likely to prefer the McDonalds-branded carrots as the plain-packaged
ones. This suggests that marketing savvy could perhaps convince
youngsters to make healthful choices. Some companies have already
begun experimenting with this tactic by using Mickey Mouse cartoons
to sell sliced fruit and placing Curious George stickers on bananas.
Last month McDonalds announced it would shift its advertising
targeted to children under the age of 13 to focus on the 375-calorie
Happy Meal, which it says meets current dietary standards outlined by
the government.
Nutritionists hope that curbing fast-food television ads will help
reverse the obesity epidemic among youngsters. But new forms of
cellphone and internet marketing mean that adolescents are
increasingly exposed to junk-food ads. "My guess is that the effects
[of ads] might even increase with time," says Thomas Robinson at the
Stanford Prevention Research Center in California, who co-authored
the new study with Borzekowski.
Journal reference: Archives of Pediatrics (vol 161, p792-797)