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Project

#FoodForTeens: Social Media Food Marketing Communication and Adolescent Eating

For years, overweight and obesity have remained among the top worldwide public health concerns. One major determinant of excess weight is the obesogenic environment we live in, promoted for by the multibillion-dollar food industry giants. Food marketing impacts dietary choices and perceived norms especially among children and adolescents, building a lifetime of food preferences and brand loyalty. Marketing’s effect on nutrition behaviour is a contemporary topic but research has mainly addressed children or adult consumers. In view of the dearth of literature on adolescents, this project focuses on food marketing’s influence on behaviour during the adolescence life stage. Specifically, the aim of this research study is to assess social media’s marketing influence on nutrition behaviour among adolescents aged 13-19 years. To assess the effect of food marketing via social media on the nutrition behaviour of adolescents, first a cross-sectional survey will be developed to measure the overall self-reported influence of social media on the attitudes and behaviours of young adolescents. Next, a set of experiments will be carried out to assess the observed effect of social media food marketing, specifically food advertisements, celebrity endorsements, and peer-to-peer advertising, on nutrition attitudes and behaviours.

Date:6 Nov 2017 →  19 May 2022
Keywords:Food marketing, Social media, Adolescent, Nutrition, Behavior
Disciplines:Communications, Communications technology
Project type:PhD project