|
 “There is an inherent message in sports about the importance of
physical fitness and health, and diet is a huge part of fitness and
health,” lead study author Marie Bragg said by email. “Having highly
visible sports organizations serve as a vehicle for promoting junk
food to children sends a mixed message that is incompatible with
maintaining a healthy diet.”
Bragg, a researcher at New York University, and colleagues focused
on the ten sports organizations with the most viewers under 18 years
old, including professional leagues for football, baseball, soccer,
hockey, golf, soccer, mixed martial arts and car racing as well as
college basketball and amateur baseball.
Researchers then identified advertisements or sponsorships promoting
food or nonalcoholic beverages on television, YouTube, and sports
organizations websites from 2006 to 2016.
Overall, food and nonalcoholic drinks accounted for 19 percent of
sponsors, second only to auto industry sponsors, researchers report
in Pediatrics.
The National Football League had the most food and beverage
sponsors, with a total of 10, followed by the National Hockey League
and Little League, with seven apiece.
When researchers rated the nutritional content of these products,
they found 76 percent of foods were unhealthy and 52 percent of
drinks were sodas or other beverages sweetened with sugar.
“I think we saw so many sodas appearing in sponsorship ads because
bottled water does not have profit margins as high as sugary drinks,
and consumers aren’t as loyal to a specific water brand as they are
to their favorite soda brand,” Bragg said. “People know they are a
`Coke’ or a `Pepsi’ person, but often don’t feel the same way about
water brands.”
The proportion of U.S. children who are overweight and obese has
been steadily climbing for years. As of 2016, about 35 percent of
children were overweight and another 26 percent were obese, a recent
study found.
While there are many reasons for this – including too much screen
time and not enough exercise – poor eating and drinking habits play
a big role.
Even when soda and junk food advertisements don’t directly target
children, kids are more easily swayed to crave products than adult
viewers, researchers say.
[to top of second column] |
“Children who view advertisements for highly palatable foods such as
chips or candy as part of TV shows or within video games will eat
more snack foods, even if they already had a meal,” said Jennifer
Emond, a researcher at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth
College in Lebanon, New Hampshire, who wasn’t involved in the study.
“We call this cued eating,” Emond said by email. “We see this in
children as young as preschool-age.”
One limitation of the study is that researchers didn’t look
separately at sponsorship appearances within games, on the
sidelines, or brands mentioned by announcers during televised games,
the authors note. Another drawback is that researchers weren’t able
to distinguish between unique viewers and repeat viewers on YouTube.
Still, the results suggest that parents need to realize that
children who sit down to watch sports are seeing much more than just
a game, said Dr. Megan Pesch, a researcher at the University of
Michigan’s C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital in Ann Arbor.
“Children are not always able to detect what is an advertisement
versus what is not,” Pesch, who wasn’t involved in the study, said
by email. “Parents can explain, in simple terms, to their children
that the athlete is paid by the company to promote the products, and
what the marketers are trying to do, namely make money.”
Putting out reasonable portions of healthy snacks during the game
may also help.
“Parents can also use this an opportunity to talk to their children
about the importance of eating unhealthy foods in moderation,
focusing on the importance of eating mostly healthy foods with the
occasional `fun’ food,” Pesch added.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/2pMccbB Pediatrics, online March 26, 2018.
[© 2018 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2018 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content.
 |
