Department of Community and Family Medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Bathinda, Punjab, 151001, India.
Departmentof Community and Family Medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Raebarely, Uttar Pradesh, 229405, India.
BMC Public Health. 2023 Feb 11;23(1):311. doi: 10.1186/s12889-023-15058-3.
Maintaining healthy eating habits among children is challenging due to industrial tactics. There is little research on the effect of nutritional labels and tv ads on the eating habits of children. So the primary aim of the study was to explore the noticeability of the food packaging labels by the children, the information retrieved from the food nutrition labels, and their role in increased frequency of eating out in addition to the perceptions of their parents about the television ads.
A cross-sectional study was conducted at schools in Punjab, India. Using multi-stage stratified random sampling, we included 722 school-going children aged 14-18 and their parents. A structured predefined questionnaire collected data using a four-point Likert scale. Descriptive statistics and binary logistic regression were used to draw our inferences.
About 46% of children were eating out > 3 times a week. Nearly 49% said they never looked at the expiry dates on the food packet, and 40% have yet to notice the quality certification. Nearly half do not understand the components of the food label, and 59% said they never changed their buying behavior because of the label. Only 37% of parents expressed their concerns about the timing of the ads when children watch television, while only 25.5% were concerned about the accuracy of the information. Concerns of the parents regarding the timing of the ads, and celebrity endorsements, were potential predictors for the increased frequency of eating out by the children.
Low awareness regarding the utility of nutrition labels and minimal concerns of the parents increase the frequency of eating out. Unification of our existing policies regarding food labels and tv advertisements to develop family-centric interventions will bring us one step closer to improving the enabling environment to curb the growing menace of childhood obesity.
由于工业策略，让儿童保持健康的饮食习惯具有挑战性。关于营养标签和电视广告对儿童饮食习惯的影响的研究很少。因此，该研究的主要目的是探索儿童对食品包装标签的关注度、从食品营养标签中获取的信息，以及它们在增加外出就餐频率方面的作用，此外还研究了父母对电视广告的看法。
在印度旁遮普邦的学校进行了一项横断面研究。我们使用多阶段分层随机抽样，纳入了 722 名 14-18 岁的在校儿童及其父母。使用四点李克特量表，通过结构化的预定义问卷收集数据。使用描述性统计和二项逻辑回归来得出我们的推论。
约 46%的儿童每周外出就餐超过 3 次。近 49%的儿童表示他们从不查看食品包装上的保质期，40%的儿童尚未注意到质量认证。近一半的儿童不了解食品标签的组成部分，59%的儿童表示他们从未因为标签而改变购买行为。只有 37%的父母对孩子看电视时广告的播放时间表示担忧，而只有 25.5%的父母对广告信息的准确性表示担忧。父母对广告播放时间和名人代言的担忧是儿童外出就餐频率增加的潜在预测因素。
对营养标签实用性的认识水平低，父母的关注度低，这增加了外出就餐的频率。统一我们现有的食品标签和电视广告政策，制定以家庭为中心的干预措施，将使我们离改善环境以遏制儿童肥胖日益严重的威胁更近一步。
