This study provides further evidence of the prominence of unhealthy foods in children's programming. These data may provide guidance for healthcare professionals, regulators and programme makers in planning for a healthier portrayal of food and beverage in children's television.

Objective: The link between childhood obesity and both television viewing and television advertising have previously been examined. We sought to investigate the frequency and type of food and beverage placements in children-specific television broadcasts and, in particular, differences between programme genres. Method: Content of five weekdays of children-specific television broadcasting on both UK (BBC) and Irish (RTE) television channels was summarized. Food and beverage placements were coded based on type of product, product placement, product use and characters involved. A comparison was made between different programme genres: animated, cartoon, child-specific, film, quiz, tween and young persons' programming. Results: A total of 1155 (BBC = 450; RTE = 705) cues were recorded giving a cue every 4·2 min, an average of 12·3 s/cue. The genre with most cues recorded was cartoon programming (30·8 %). For the majority of genres, cues related to sweet snacks (range 1·8-23·3 %) and sweets/candy (range 3·6-25·8 %) featured highly. Fast-food (18·0 %) and sugar-sweetened beverage (42·3 %) cues were observed in a high proportion of tween programming. Celebratory/social motivation factors (range 10-40 %) were most common across all genres while there were low proportions of cues based on reward, punishment or healthrelated motivating factors. Conclusions: The study provides evidence for the prominence of energy-dense/ nutrient-poor foods and beverages in children's programming. Of particular interest is the high prevalence of fast-food and sugar-sweetened beverage cues associated with tween programming. These results further emphasize the need for programme makers to provide a healthier image of foods and beverages in children's television.

BackgroundTelevision watching is obesogenic due to its sedentary nature and programming content, which influences children. Few studies have examined exercise placement within children-specific programming. This study aimed to investigate the frequency and type of exercise placement in children-specific television broadcasts and to compare placements on the UK and Irish television channels.MethodsContent analysis for five weekdays’ worth of children-specific television broadcasting totaling 82.5 hours on both the UK (British Broadcasting Corporation) and Irish (Radió Teilifís Éireann) television channels was performed. For the purposes of comparing the UK and Irish placements, analysis was restricted to programming broadcast between 6 am and 11.30 am. Exercise placements were coded based on type of activity, activity context, activity motivating factors and outcome, and characters involved.ResultsA total of 780 cues were recorded during the total recording period. A wide variety of sports were depicted, but dancing-related cues were most commonly seen (n=163, 23.3%), with the majority of cues being of mild (n=365, 65.9%) or moderate (n=172, 31.0%) intensity. The majority of cues were associated with a positive outcome (n=404, 61.4%), and social motivations were most commonly seen (n=289, 30.3%). The Irish and the UK portrayals were broadly similar.ConclusionThis study highlights the wide variety of sports portrayed and the active effort undertaken by television stations to depict physical exercise and recreation in a positive light.