From Tastes Great to Cool: Children's Food Marketing and the Rise of the Symbolic

Children's exposure to food marketing has exploded in recent years, along with rates of obesity and overweight. Children of color and low-income children are disproportionately at risk for both marketing exposure and becoming overweight. Comprehensive reviews of the literature show that advertising is effective in changing children's food preferences and diets. This paper surveys the scope and scale of current marketing practices, and focuses on the growing use of symbolic appeals that are central in food brands to themes such as finding an identity and feeling powerful and in control. These themes are so potent because they are central to children in their development and constitution of self. The paper concludes that reduction of exposure to marketing will be a central part of any successful anti-obesity strategy.

[1]  Steven L Gortmaker,et al.  Relation between consumption of sugar-sweetened drinks and childhood obesity: a prospective, observational analysis , 2001, The Lancet.

[2]  Jeffrey E. Brand,et al.  Commercials in the classroom: The impact of Channel One advertising , 1994 .

[3]  H. Pollack,et al.  Epidemic increase in childhood overweight, 1986-1998. , 2001, JAMA.

[4]  Gerald J. Gorn,et al.  Behavioral Evidence of the Effects of Televised Food Messages on Children , 1982 .

[5]  T. Robinson,et al.  Is parental control over children's eating associated with childhood obesity? Results from a population-based sample of third graders. , 2001, Obesity research.

[6]  Robert Needlman,et al.  Food Marketing to Children and Youth: Threat or Opportunity? , 2009 .

[7]  T. Robinson,et al.  The 30-second effect: an experiment revealing the impact of television commercials on food preferences of preschoolers. , 2001, Journal of the American Dietetic Association.

[8]  L. Birch,et al.  Restricting access to palatable foods affects children's behavioral response, food selection, and intake. , 1999, The American journal of clinical nutrition.

[9]  B. Popkin,et al.  US adolescent food intake trends from 1965 to 1996 , 2000, Archives of disease in childhood.

[10]  Simone French,et al.  Food Advertising and Marketing Directed at Children and Adolescents in the US , 2004, The international journal of behavioral nutrition and physical activity.

[11]  J. Latham.  Food Fight: The Inside Story of the Food Industry, America's Obesity Crisis, and What We Can Do About It. , 2004 .

[12]  M. J. Maloney,et al.  Soft Drink Consumption Among US Children and Adolescents: Nutritional Consequences , 1999 .

[13]  Dale L Kunkel,et al.  Children and Television Advertising , 2001 .

[14]  F. Chaloupka,et al.  Tobacco Advertising: Economic Theory and International Evidence , 1999 .

[15]  L. Birch,et al.  Young girls' emerging dietary restraint and disinhibition are related to parental control in child feeding , 2000, Appetite.

[16]  B. Pescosolido.  TEACHING MEDICAL SOCIOLOGY THROUGH FILM: THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES AND PRACTICAL TOOLS* , 1990 .

[17]  T. Patterson,et al.  Television's Influence on Children's Diet and Physical Activity , 1989, Journal of developmental and behavioral pediatrics : JDBP.

[18]  P. Agron,et al.  Fast food sales on high school campuses: results from the 2000 California high school fast food survey. , 2002, The Journal of school health.

[19]  Margaret Lears,et al.  Television and Children's Conceptions of Nutrition: Unhealthy Messages , 1992 .

[20]  S. Linn.  Consuming Kids: The Hostile Takeover of Childhood , 2004 .

[21]  Roland Marchand,et al.  Advertising the American Dream: Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940 , 1986 .

[22]  Tapia Granados,et al.  Fast food nation: the dark side of the all-American meal , 2002 .

[23]  Alissa Quart,et al.  Branded: The Buying And Selling Of Teenagers , 2003 .

[24]  J. Levine.  Food industry marketing in elementary schools: implications for school health professionals. , 1999, The Journal of school health.

[25]  L. Birch,et al.  Restricting Access to Foods and Children's Eating , 1999, Appetite.

[26]  Pola B. Gupta,et al.  Consumers' Perceptions of the Ethics and Acceptability of Product Placements in Movies: Product Category and Individual Differences , 1997 .

[27]  S. Benson.  Advertising the American Dream: Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940 Roland Marchand , 1988 .

[28]  N. Cotugna,et al.  A Quarter Century of TV Food Advertising Targeted at Children. , 1999 .

[29]  B. Popkin,et al.  Environmental influences on food choice, physical activity and energy balance , 2005, Physiology & Behavior.

[30]  B. Lin,et al.  American Children's Diets Not Making the Grade , 2001 .

[31]  T N Robinson,et al.  Reducing children's television viewing to prevent obesity: a randomized controlled trial. , 1999, JAMA.

[32]  C. Ebbeling,et al.  Childhood obesity: public-health crisis, common sense cure , 2002, The Lancet.

[33]  Elizabeth Robles.  Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal , 2002 .

[34]  B. Popkin,et al.  US adolescent food intake trends from 1965 to 1996 , 2000, Archives of disease in childhood.

[35]  Marvin E. Goldberg,et al.  A Quasi-Experiment Assessing the Effectiveness of TV Advertising Directed to Children , 1990 .

[36]  R. Puhl,et al.  Childhood obesity: a societal problem to solve , 2003, Obesity reviews : an official journal of the International Association for the Study of Obesity.

[37]  Juliet B. Schor.  When Childhood Gets Commercialized, Can Children Be Protected?1 , 2006 .

[38]  D. Holt.  Why Do Brands Cause Trouble? A Dialectical Theory of Consumer Culture and Branding , 2002 .

[39]  L. Birch,et al.  Mothers' child-feeding practices influence daughters' eating and weight. , 2000, The American journal of clinical nutrition.

[40]  B. Dawson,et al.  How Pronutrition Television Programming Affects Children's Dietary Habits. , 1984 .

[41]  A. Molnar.  Giving Kids The Business: The Commercialization Of America's Schools , 1996 .

[42]  Gene Del Vecchio,et al.  Creating Ever-Cool: A Marketer’s Guide to a Kid’s Heart , 1997 .

[43]  Douglas B. Holt,et al.  How Brands Become Icons: The Principles of Cultural Branding , 2004 .