Rising to the challenge: Introducing protocols to monitor food marketing to children from the World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe

Abstract

Unhealthy marketing has been unequivocally linked to children's food preferences, requests, purchases and eating behaviors and hence to childhood obesity. Regulating children's exposure to such marketing has been identified as a key challenge to which States must rise. Regulation mandates the need for monitoring and hence for credible data that are comparable between countries, regions and across time. However, there are major challenges presented by the complexity of the digital marketing ecosystem including the personalized targeting with persuasive, exploitative advertising to which children are subject. This narrative review identifies challenges faced by researchers in the digital ecosystem; reviews recent papers attempting to address these and specifies benefits and limitations; and introduces a set of WHO protocols with templates and guidance for studies of food marketing to children.

Impact of a voluntary industry code for advertising food to children and young people: an analysis of New Zealand television data

“…Currently, very few countries have regular practices to monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of policies to restrict unhealthy food and drink advertisements on television or other media over time, despite a recommendation from the WHO (11,44,45) . It is worthwhile to conduct research independently of the food and advertising industry to provide a universal benchmark for research when globally assessing policies over time (16,26) .…”

“…Unlike television, internet and social media content is always accessible which inherently makes all children vulnerable to advertising at any time of the day. Barriers to monitoring include the ethical challenges of collecting personal data from social media users, and personalised tailoring of advertisements depending on individual use of media (44,45,48) . Options could be to use a browser extension to monitor advertisements seen online (49) or to utilise a 2019 comprehensive monitoring framework developed by WHO (45) .…”

Food promoted on an online food delivery platform in a Brazilian metropolis during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic: a longitudinal analysis

“…We also investigated the marketing strategies used to persuade users to buy food items based on previous frameworks about advertising strategies with different media (27,28) . The various strategies leverage the power of advertising with endorsements and influencers (e.g.…”

“…buy-one-get-one-free offers, gifts, collectables and limited editions), and claims (e.g. messages emphasising sensory-based characteristics such as flavour, taste, aroma; descriptions of the benefits of using/consuming the product) (27,28) . We considered adaptations of these strategies by the OFD platforms in our data collection, and we investigated the use of photos, discounts, 'combo deals' (combinations of food items and drinks offered at a discount), and messages on healthiness, value for the money, tastiness, and pleasure (Table 3).…”

Reflexos da mídia na formação de hábitos alimentares de crianças e adolescentes a nível global – uma revisão bibliográfica

“…ParaTatlow-Golden et al (2021) o controle e monitoramento do marketing de produtos alimentícios voltados para o público infantil é desafiador. Entretanto o monitoramento se faz necessário, podendo contribuir com a redução de Doenças Crônicas não Transmissíveis (DCNT), e obesidade.…”