Obesity has been a common lifestyle in the lives of North Americans for many years. According to the Harvard Public School of Health, “the words overweight or obesity are ways to describe having too much body fat” (Cheung, 2016). Childhood obesity and adult obesity are different due to the growth rate of children. Childhood obesity has been a rising factor in today’s world. Obesity in children puts them at major risk for diseases such as cardiovascular disease and health problems earlier in age and well as mental health issues like anxiety and depression. Junk food or fast food marketing is one of the major reasons why childhood obesity is on the rise.There are many different aspects that have to do with childhood obesity such as genetics, …show more content…
In this paper, it will focus on how junk food marketing impacts childhood obesity. Childhood obesity continues to be on the rise from junk food marketing because of the schools food policies and vending machines, increased junk food available at supermarkets and advertisements in social media. Schools have policies on what food is being served in their cafeterias or in the vending machines. Cafeterias sell greasy foods such as curly fries, poutine, pizza and multitudes of cookies and other baked goods. The cafeteria food that is purchased is significantly cheaper in large frozen, junk food quantities which will keep the prices of foods down for the school. Nutritious food has not always been thought out for the children who are purchasing the food from the cafeteria or vending machine. The boards tend to care more about the costs saved on junk foods rather then the rise of obesity within the child generation. Cafeterias with greasy foods and vending machines that are stocked with chips, chocolate and pop continuously allow childhood obesity to be on the rise. Schools have vending machines that sell junk food which contribute to the evolution of childhood …show more content…
According to Mark Dolliver, “foods account for 39 percent of TV advertising seen by 2-7 year olds, 95 percent of that seen by 8-19s and 92 percent of that seen by 13-17s.On a typical day, the 2-7 year olds are exposed to 4:51 minutes of food commercials.” (Dolliver, 2007. p.1) Dolliver used statistics to show much how children are seeing these commercials. Throughout the rest of the article he talks about the increasing amounts of time that children spend watching television and the types of foods that are being advertised. Depending on the family dynamic in the household, children could be watching more television than the statistics that Dolliver presents in his study. This is what would be characterized as the advertisement of obesity in todays society. Before televisions were made, there were print advertisements that contributed to the purchasing of junk or fast foods like the 1956 Canada Dry Ginger Ale Print Ad. Although for 1956, there is not a lot of information about the obesity epidemic, it contributes to how powerful advertisements can be. These advertisements whether it is from the 1950s or if it is from today, largely influence the food quality that children are wanting or expecting. When children are exposed to television advertisements about unhealthy products in large quantities, they are more susceptible to the risk of obesity. Television
Obesity in the United States, which the media has labeled a national crisis, has also been connected to poverty rates. Big fast food industry’s target poor communities, and spend millions of dollars each year to create advertising that appeals to these specific areas. These industry’s also target naïve children when advertising because they know that eating habits developed in childhood are usually carried into adulthood. Children who are exposed to television advertisements for unhealthy food and who are not educated well enough on good nutrition will grow up and feed their families the same unhealthy foods they ate as kids. A big way fast food giants are able to make certain young people have access to unhealthy food is by strategically placing franchises in close proximity to schools. They will often place three times as many outlets within walking distance of schools than in areas where there are no schools nearby. The way fast food advertising is targeted towards children is very alarming considering how important good nutrition is for young people and how a child’s eating habits can affect their growth and
Unhealthy foods are what make the money for schools and that is why they serve them for students. (Schlafy) Schools feel like they need the extra money in the budget, even though it is at the student’s expense. Data shows that nearly 60% of all middle schools in the US serve soda from vending machines. (Schlafy) Soda is very high in sugar and is not at all good for children, but it is still sold in school vending machines. The ways food in schools is now are way too high in fats and sugars. This is not good for the children and very bad in the long run. Elementary schoolchildren have an estimated $15 billion of their own money that they can use to buy whatever they want in schools, and parents have almost another $160 billion to give students for food money. (Schlafy) Big businesses see this as a big source of profit and therefore encourage children to buy their products, and want them to be offered in school because of th4e likelihood of children buying the business’s product. All in all, obesity in the US is greatly influenced by the foods offered in schools
Fast food companies have caused a massive negative impact to society over the last couple of years despite the companies promise to produce healthy and nutritious meals. Many people have already been affected by the damages caused by eating junk food. During the 1950s, the United States Of America had an obesity rate of under 10 percent and as the fast food chain increased in 1975, the obesity rate rose up to a whopping 32 percent and has only kept growing. As the obesity rate increased so had the other forms of diseases that have and will continue to affect people until it has been known that the junk food is the primary cause and to stop or minimise the junk food intake.150 billion dollars (and still increasing) has been spent on obesity related diseases while a 174 billion dollars has been spent for treatment for diabetes and as more people consume junk food so has been the rate for treatment. In order to reduce medical expenses and self harm from junk food one must first switch to a healthy and proactive lifestyle.If the adults do not stop this bad habit children will follow and be affected in the near future. Foreign countries whom have been developing over the last decade had been impacted as well due to the lack of knowledge of the harm of the product. In 2013, the World Health Organisation declared that 42 million
...f television advertisements for junk food versus nutritious food on children's food attitudes and preferences. Social science & medicine, 65, (7), pp. 1311-1323.
Throughout the United States, concern of rising health issues is a popular topic. Over a progression of many years, American fast food chains and junk food companies have risen as a common means for food replacing homemade family meals. This quick and easy habit of buying cheaply made and sold foods that lack real nutritional value has been reason for increasing health issues. This habit is seen in children just the same as adults. Children eat the quickest meal with the most sugar and fat (among other unhealthy ingredients). This habit needs to be broken to take better care of the children today. Children are eating snack cakes and other junk foods at school instead of the breakfast/lunch that is offered causing bad habits and a poor diet. The children of America are suffering from the effects of malnutrition and yet, society does not help them to better understand or give higher grade options for them to choose from. Therefore, junk food should not be allowed in schools as it imposes health risks on children, lacks requirements for the nutrition contained in them, and without offering them, children would learn many morals/lessons.
According to “Burger Battles” from the Weekly Reader, obesity is defined as a person whose weight is 20 percent higher than recommended for their height (Burger Battles 1). When this condition begins to affect children lives, it is then known as childhood obesity. Within the United States of America, around 15 percent of children are considered to be obese (Holguin 3). Increasing tremendously, this outbreak has actually tripled in the amount of obese teen and doubled in children up to the age of thirteen (Burger Battles 2). One of the factors that is usually overlooked in the cause for obesity is the role of television. Not only does it reduce the amount of physical activity, the advertisements and commercials are targeting innocent viewers. In a survey completed by Gary Ruskin of Commercial Alert, the average child watches nearly 19 hours and 40 minutes of television a week (Ruskin 2). With that amount of time spent watching television, advertisements for fast food will be entering the children’s minds.
Consumers and health organizations have sought to acknowledge the accumulated problem of childhood obesity in the United States. This research will provide evidence that television advertisements influence food preferences, and are associated with the increased epidemic of obesity among children. I will be talking about food advertising and its effects on children. Today, food companies have made children their biggest targets. A food marketer is interested in youths as consumers because of their purchasing power and their influence over their spending habits.
It has been said that the amount of fast-food advertisements that children are becoming obese and from several sources they have said that from the ages 2 to 5 the percentage of children overweight is 13% to 19%. Many studies show that the advertisements are giving the idea to children to want to eat. The institution of Medicine in 2006 showed compelling evidence of ads for food increased children obesity.
Remember how happy you were when your parents bought you a happy meal as a child. It came in that cool little red box with some fries and chicken nuggets. Oh, and best of all it always came with a toy; your parents would tell you not to open it until you finished your food but that never happened. Or the time you forgot money at home but still managed to scrap up a dollar and sixteen cents from your car for an iced sweet tea. Fast food always comes in the clutch, but what is really behind the happy meals and sweet teas. We all know fast food is not good for you, but who’s to blame. Is it fair that we blame fast-food chains or are we just to afraid to blame ourselves?
One way that fast food effects obesity is by advertising their products to children (Miller). In her article Food Advertising Contributes to Obesity, Patti Miller explains that the fast food companies are targeting kids and teenagers by advertising on television. The fast food advertisements are promoting unhealthy products as acceptable food which influences children to choose those meals. The American Psychological Association, an organization focused on improving the lives of individuals, expressed that with the exposure of different fast food commercials, children request to purchase these unhealthy products and cause the parents to be influenced by these requests. This concludes the idea that once children are encouraged by the commercials, they opt to consume the fast food advertised on television. Today, fast food companies are even advertising through schools by offering pizzas and burgers as school lunches, which consequently becomes a daily meal for children and teenagers to consume (Wadden, Brownell,
Powell LM, Schermbeck RM, Szczypka G, Chaloupka FJ, Braunschweig CL. Trends in the Nutritional Content of Television Food Advertisements Seen by Children in the United States: Analyses by Age, Food Categories, and Companies. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2011;165(12):1078-1086. doi:10.1001/archpediatrics.2011.131.
Beales III, J. Howard, and Robert Kulick. Does Advertising On Television Cause Childhood Obesity? A Longitudinal Analysis. Journal Of Public Policy & Marketing 32.2 (2013): 185-194. Business Source Complete. Web. 19 Nov. 2013.
Through Eric Schlosser’s book Fast Food Nation he examines the effects that fast food has impacted the world and the way it is affecting the people that are consuming it. As the fast food industry continues to grow throughout not only the United States but the whole world, marketing companies are always looking for ways to broaden the group of people that are interested in buying their product over another company’s. As a marketer for a fast food company it is essential to have a group of people that you can rely on to always buy the company’s product, to many fast food companies they found this group of people to be adolescents and children. Marketing groups specifically market their products to entice this group of people to lure them in. Food is an object that is needed for the survival of a human, but the type of food that humans chose to eat is also not always the best. Because fast food is so cheap and easily accessible just about everywhere you turn your head, many people resort to eating it even though it is very unhealthy. With these factors present, many adults have exposed their children to fast food at a young age, these parents do not always think about the long term effects of feeding their children fast food because they are so caught up in the moment of feeding their kids right then and there; they do not think about the health risks that can occur later as a result from eating fast food now.
(Dame Suzi Leather, the Daily Mail 1, page 2). Schools have a responsibility to provide healthy food choices and not just the cheapest ones (which usually happens to be the unhealthy kind). The majority of schools have contracts with unhealthy food suppliers. Most of the budget usually goes to funding sports. What the school boards do not realize is that eating healthy is a crucial part of staying fit, and if the school districts were to pick healthier food suppliers they would see that local food suppliers would gladly provide them with these choices, as it is good business for them.
In other words, the food that is being advertised to the children is usually foods that is unhealthy and that can the children gaining weight and probably becoming obese. These advertisements promoting poor nutritional quality are not good for the children’s health. The advertising of this unhealthy food to the children impacts how children are deciding to eat instead of wanting to eat healthier