Will veggie superheroes encourage kids to make healthier food choices?
It’s no secret that most kids don’t like veggies – at least not as much as they like other foods like Kraft Dinner, ice cream and French fries. But Andrew Hanks of Ohio State University hopes that marketing may be able to change that mentality.
“If we put the time and good resources into marketing healthy choices to kids, it can work,” he tells Eurekalert.
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Hanks and his team recently conducted an experiment in 10 public elementary schools across New York State, trialling three different approaches to intervention. In some schools, they created a banner for the salad bar in the cafeteria that showed veggies as superheroes and in other schools they played a promotional video about the “Super Sprowtz” in the lunch room. In the third test group, they implemented both the banner and video. They found that the schools where the banners were used saw the percentage of kids reaching for veggies double and in schools where both the banners and videos were used, there was a 10 per cent increase in veggie consumption. No significant changes were seen with just the use of the videos.
“Marketing can have both positive and negative effects,” Hanks said. “But instead of avoiding it completely, we can harness the power of marketing to help us.”
Hanks was also surprised to discover that the marketing worked on both male and female students, as girls are generally more likely to make healthy choices.
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While Hanks was pleased with the results, he’s quick to note that this study was specifically carried out in urban schools, where salad bars are already present. He admits that results could differ in a suburban or rural school or schools where students are less affluent. That said, it’s an interesting approach to promoting healthy eating.
“If we can encourage kids to take vegetables of their own accord, rather than have someone put it there for them, they’re much more likely to eat them,“ Hanks said.
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