Welcome to “FitnessMantra Weekend”, your once-a-week health news update. As always you can also stay updated with the latest in fitness news by subscribing separately to the Fitness Mantra del.icio.us feed.
Most certainly the big news of the week is the effect that simply packaging any food in a McDonald’s wrapper has on kids: they just seem to like it better! As we read about how McDonald’s marketing tricks tots’ taste buds, we can also learn about how even the youngest among us can be influenced by advertising and marketing by big firms.
In the study, when identical foods like hamburgers, french fries, carrots or milk were tested on 63 kids using both McDonald’s wrappers and plain packaging, the McDonald’s wrapped foods seemed to taste better for a majority of the kids (as high as 75%).
Study author Dr. Tom Robinson said the kids’ perception of taste was “physically altered by the branding.” The Stanford University researcher said it was remarkable how children so young were already so influenced by advertising.
Of course McDonald’s has promised to curb advertising to children and says it will serve fruit in its happy meals which the company says will now contain less fat and fewer calories. But the study can be an important find for parents trying to get their kids to eat nutritiously.
In what can be considered a follow-up article, Think like a marketer to get kids to eat healthy, tells us how we can use what we have learned from the study to our advantage. Most of the appeal created by McDonald’s is around making eating there a fun event for the whole family in a cheery and stress-free environment. Well, then isn’t it time we created such an atmosphere at home during mealtimes?
“We need to create that fun atmosphere at home — turn off television, sit at the table and eat, talk and have a good time.†There should be healthy food and a positive feeling around eating at the dinner table.
Another tip revolves around the high prevalence of children-targeted advertising on the TV. The solution? Why keep the TV out of sight, of course:
“The biggest vehicle for exposure [to unhealthful foods] is sitting right in the middle of the living room — and far too often also in the kitchen and bedroom,†says Ludwig, whose first rule is to the get the TV out of the kitchen.
Read both articles for the problem and (few possible) solutions to getting kids to eat more healthfully. If we cannot beat the folks at McDonald’s at their multi-billion dollar game, then maybe it’s time we joined them!
Here are the week’s top health and fitness stories:
- Overeat? Hormone may be to blame: The hormone that tells us we are full also regulates our desire for certain foods, researchers said Thursday.
- Obese kids miss the most school: Obese elementary schoolchildren miss a couple more school days on average than their normal-weight classmates, according to a study that says being fat is a better predictor for absenteeism than any other factor.
- To Gain Muscle And Lose Fat, Drink Milk, Study Suggests: Part of an ongoing study into the impact of drinking milk after heavy weightlifting has found that milk helps exercisers burn more fat.
- Americans see fat as normal as weights rise: study: Carrying a spare tire or two around the waist has become socially acceptable in the United States as the population’s waistlines have expanded, according to a study released on Tuesday.
- Body fat ‘weighs up love choices’: People often choose partners with similar body fatness to their own, according to new research.
- Diet food ‘may fuel obesity risk’: Diet foods for children may inadvertently lead to overeating and obesity, say researchers.
- McDonald’s label tricks tots’ taste buds: Even carrots, milk and apple juice tasted better to the kids when they were wrapped in the familiar packaging of the Golden Arches.
- A Link Between Bones and Obesity: No one suspected just how powerful a role the bones play in so fundamental an activity as regulating sugar.
- Obesity ‘linked to birth defects’: Women who are obese when they conceive are more likely to have babies with birth defects than are mothers of normal weight, a US study suggests.
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Have a great weekend!
[tags]health, fitness, health news, fitness news, health links, fitness links, del.icio.us, mcdonalds, children[/tags]
