Study highlights influence social media has on children’s food intake

Washington: A new study now highlights the negative influence that social media has on children’s food intake.
The new University of Liverpool research, published in Pediatrics, shows celebrity endorsement and television advertising of unhealthy foods increases children’s intake of these foods. However, children are increasingly exposed to marketing through digital avenues, such as on social media, and the impact of marketing by YouTube video bloggers (vloggers) on these outcomes has, until now, not been known.
According to the new report by Ofcom children in the UK now access social media more than ever before.
Approximately 93 percent of 8-11-year-olds go online, 77 percent use YouTube and 18 per cent have a social media account. In older children (12-15-year-olds), 99 per cent go online, 89 percent use YouTube and 69 percent have a social media account. Both age groups watch YouTube vloggers.
Ph.D. student Anna Coates, from the University’s Appetite and Obesity research group, conducted a study to examine the effect of social media marketing of snack foods (healthy and unhealthy), via vloggers’ Instagram pages, on children’s snack intake.
During the study 176 children, aged between 9 and 11 years, were randomly split into three equal groups and were shown artificially created, but realistic, Instagram pages of popular vloggers (each has millions of followers).