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  • Page | Last updated: 08 Apr 2021

Marketing impacts

Health Promotion Knowledge Gateway

Marketing impacts as described by relevant food- and health-related organisations

Nutritional knowledge
WHO 2007a (pdf), WHO 2009 (pdf)
  • TV food advertising (TVFA) has little effect on general perception of the constituents of a healthy diet, although it can have more specific effects on nutritional knowledge in certain contexts (modest evidence).
FSA 2003
  • TVFA has little effect on children’s nutritional knowledge on what constitutes a healthy diet (modest evidence).
  • TVFA influenced beliefs concerning food and beverage composition and 'healthfulness' (moderate evidence). Insufficient evidence available for adolescents (12-18 yrs). 

 

Food preferences
WHO 2007a (pdf), WHO 2009 (pdf)
  • TVFA may influence children’s food preferences (modest evidence).
  • TVFA influences food purchased by children, as well as their food purchase behaviour (strong evidence).
CAP 2014 (pdf), CAP 2015 (pdf)
  • 'Some studies suggest online marketing can influence children’s brand awareness and their short-term food preferences. There are indications that advergames have this effect, making children more likely to choose an advertised unhealthya snack over a healthier alternative directly after playing a game. By contrast, similar studies with advergames for healthy eating provided inconclusive results'.
OfCom 2004 (pdf), OfCom 2006 (pdf)
  • TVFA can have a modest direct effect, and is likely to have large indirect effects on food preferences. Not possible to assess the magnitude of effects compared to other relevant factors.
FSA 2003
  • TVFA can affect children's preferences as well as purchase-related behaviour, leading to increased purchase requests of HFSS foods (strong evidence).  

 

Short-term food consumption
WHO 2007a (pdf), WHO 2009 (pdf)
  • TVFA influences food consumption under certain conditions (modest evidence).
FSA 2003
  • TVFA can affect children’s consumption behaviour (modest evidence).
  • TVFA influenced short term consumption of children 2-11 yrs. (strong evidence); insufficient evidence available for teens (12-18 yrs).
  • In the first meta-analysis on the subject, TV or internet food and beverage advertisement was found to have a small-to-moderate effect in children’s food intake during controlled experiments, resulting in eating more during and after acute exposure to advertising.

 

Diet
WHO 2007a (pdf), WHO 2009 (pdf)
  • TVFA significantly influences food behaviour and diet in children, independent of other factors (e.g. parental diet, supervision of diets).
  • No quantitative comparison possible between advertising and other factors affecting dietary behaviour; however, evidence consistently indicates that the advertising effect on food behaviour and diet can be similar or greater to the other factors (e.g. parental dietary behaviour, influence of peers, TV viewing).
CAP 2014 (pdf), CAP 2015 (pdf)
  • No evidence available about the impact of online exposure on food choice behaviour or dietary consumption.
FSA 2003
  • TVFA can influence diet independently of other factors, but no comparison can be made on the size of the effect.
  • TVFA influences usual dietary intake of children aged 2-5 yrs (moderate evidence) and 6-11 yrs (weak evidence). In addition, there is weak evidence that it does not influence usual dietary intake of teens (12-18 yrs).  

 

Health
WHO 2007a (pdf), WHO 2009 (pdf)
  • Evidence of small but significant associations between TV viewing and diet quality, obesity, and blood cholesterol levels; potential effect of food advertising could not be separated from other effects related to TV viewing.
  • Heavy marketing of fast food outlets and energy-dense, micronutrient-poor foods and beverages is a probable aetiological factor for obesity.
OfCom 2004 (pdf), OfCom 2006 (pdf)
  • Modest but consistent association between TV exposure and obesity in children/adolescents, but it is not clear if this is only due to food advertising or also due to increased snacking and sedentary behaviours associated with TV viewing.
FSA 2003
  • Significant association between TV viewing and obesity and cholesterol levels (reasonably strong evidence). Not possible to distinguish if the effect is due to programme content, sedentary behaviour, snacking, or food advertising itself.  
  • Strong evidence that TVFA is associated with adiposity in both children (2-11 yrs) and adolescents (12-18 yrs), even after taking into account snacking, sedentary behaviour, programme content, and other factors. Insufficient evidence to support causality.

a The adjective 'healthy' or 'unhealthy' to characterise a specific food or a food category, is reported here as used in the original source of information and could have different meanings. WHO states that unhealthy foods can be defined in various ways, such as using national food-based dietary guidelines, or as identified in expert reports such as Diet, Nutrition and the Prevention of Chronic Diseases, WHO Technical Report 916.