Identification of a Social Problem: Fast-food Intake among Youth – An Interactive Narrative Review

Abstract

Fast food is a type of food that is prepared and served quickly, often available for take-out or drive-thru, and typically offered by restaurants, chains, or franchises. This is an interactive narrative review that brings to the surface the real challenge of youth fast-food consumption as an emerging issue linked with serious health complications such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases. According to many research studies, it has been indicated that young people “over-consume” fast foods hugely, whereby in the United States, 34% of children and adolescents consume fast food daily, and similar trends are being observed across the globe. For instance, some of the contributing factors such as convenience, affordability, aggressive marketing, and high accessibility, together with parental influence, have acted as the potential reasons behind this behavior. These facts highlight the importance of establishing efficient food-related lifestyle modification measures. Among the existing solutions are nutrition education, new policies for school meals, parental involvement, rules for food marketing, and community-based applications. Once more, however, the implementation of such measures is hindered by budget constraints, resistance to market regulations, and a plethora of cultural preferences. These challenges can be mitigated by innovative approaches such as gamifying healthy eating, through augmented and virtual reality experiences, using healthy food trucks, and partnering with social media influencers. Other innovations are the redesign of healthy school cafeterias and classes using these interactivities to spark young minds to embrace the food laboratory experiences. New ideas are also shared in terms of community-shared agriculture programs, digital educational resources for parents, youth-led advocacy groups, and virtual cooking competitions. The final remark underscores the necessity of developing multidimensional, innovative approaches incorporating gamification, technology, and community that help foster a healthy eating environment for children. By empowering our young people as agents of change and arming families, schools, communities, and policymakers with the right skills and tools, we can reduce the risks for health problems related to fast-food consumption and offer brighter prospects for long-term health gains among the younger generation.