Interactive Food and Beverage Marketing: Targeting Children and Youth in the Digital Age

Experts point to a combination of economic, social, and environmental changes over the last three decades that have contributed to these alarming health trends of youth and children, including: cutbacks in physical education programs; the relative decline in the cost of food; the rise in fast food, convenience food, and eating outside of the home; and the increasing availability of snacks and sodas in public schools. A major factor is the disturbing shift in the overall nutritional patterns among all children and adolescents, who now consume high levels of saturated fat, sugars, and salt, and low levels of fruit and vegetables.