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Nutrition Information and Children's Fast Food Menu Choices
Author(s) -
STUTTS MARY ANN,
ZANK GAIL M.,
SMITH KAREN H.,
WILLIAMS SALLY A.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
journal of consumer affairs
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.582
H-Index - 62
eISSN - 1745-6606
pISSN - 0022-0078
DOI - 10.1111/j.1745-6606.2010.01192.x
Subject(s) - calorie , food choice , symbol (formal) , psychology , perception , food science , advertising , environmental health , medicine , computer science , biology , business , pathology , neuroscience , programming language , endocrinology
An experiment with 236 children, ages 6 to 11, tested whether providing nutrition information (calories and fat grams) or healthy heart symbol on fast food menus influenced the calories and fat content of the items they chose to order. There was evidence that children exposed to menus with heart symbols chose healthier meals than children exposed to menus with calories and fat content or menus with no nutrition information. Children of parents with inaccurate perceptions of their child's weight tended to make poorer food choices, as did children who visited fast food restaurants more frequently.