The Effects Of Advertising Junk Food
Nutrition is a key role in many everyone’s life and plays many rolls influencing our health. According to the World Health Organization, heart disease was the number one cause of death globally in 2016 with nearly 10 million deaths a year. Knowing that the likeliness of heart disease and other diseases increases with poor nutrition values, why are there so many advertisements promoting junk food companies? Sporting events such as the Olympics and World Cup are impactful towards the millions of viewers while displaying athletic abilities, yet they endorse junk food companies and contradict themselves. Nutrition values are dire to a healthy life, yet it is often times over looked in children and adolescence. When habits are formed at young ages they are likely to be carried on to adulthood and have a long-term effect. With scientist discovering harmful habits daily, it is important to create healthy habits in children and young adults. After many years of figuring out the effects of smoking, ads for smoking vanished from television and radio, so why hasn’t the advertisements for junk food vanished yet? To understand this, we must see the effects of advertisements on us, how to change the intake of these ads, and see who this is really affecting.
Advertising has been around for centuries and has influenced our culture to surround industries at all times. According to the University of Southern California’s study on the Psychology of Advertising, the average child sees over 20, 000 advertisements each year and the average adult sees over two million ads every year. With information from these ads constantly taking our sub conscious thoughts, what information is being processed and remembered? Listening to ads, there are many notable things from most ads such as prices that can catch our attentions. When ads are created they relate mostly to logos and pathos to gain customers. Studies have been taking place for years to find new and effective ways to advertise, however, when promoting items that have a negative effect on us, is it taking advantage? Less than 15 years ago pro smoking ads were everywhere including Colorado’s own Coors Field. This shows just how perspective of negative appeals may change when information of the dangers are given to us. When advertisements are rational they relate to logic and reason rather than the emotional aspect of a customer. By comparing prices of a competitor, an ad provides data that provides customers with confidence.
Rational advertisements can be seen as things we need such as comparing prices for a refrigerator or washer and dryer. Advertisements also tend to appeal to people by using methods such as pathos, which is emotional aspects to relate to the customer. Emotional responses can be broken down into two groups, creative and empathetic. Ads that cause thinking or feeling tend to be more effective in persuading a consumer to buy their product. Today, it is found that high impact advertising is based “on evocating ad-sensuous appeals which lead to generation of strong positive emotions”. Ad-sensuous are appeals caused by ads that trigger senses such as smell, taste, and sight, rather than intellect. Appealing to our senses also helps us remember as it is the first step into long term memory. “Thinking vs. Feeling: The Psychology of Advertisements, ” is an article that studies the importance of ads to the average person’s life. After displaying facts about the ads we view, they dive into greater depth by breaking them down to how something so little as a color can influence our decisions. This source describes just how impactful advertisements are on how we decide on what to eat.
Advertising is an art that shapes our economy. For example, ads will purposely aim to get our attention by appealing to a certain group of people. Classifying people into groups can make it easier for companies to target and appeal to them. As written in, Television Advertising Leads to Unhealthy Habits in Children, a child’s mind is influenced by what they are surrounded by. When children are exposed to tv they are also exposed to ads that are made specifically to target them. According to phycologist Dale Kunkel PhD. , “While older children and adults understand the inherent bias of advertising, younger children do not, and therefore tend to interpret commercial claims and appeals as accurate and truthful information. ” This is a perfect example of creating preferences at young ages with foods. This may also put pressure on parents to avoid conflict with their kid when denying their request. A big factor in exposer to junk food are sporting events. People of all ages around the world are watching sporting events throughout the year. Children and adolescents are usually exposed to sports by their family preferences and this creates a mindset that can create habits of watching events and team preferences.
“Should 'Junk Food' Companies Be Sponsoring Major Sporting Events?” is an article that deals mostly of how it is hypocritical to have events such as the Olympics and the World Cup sponsored by ‘junk food companies. ’ Rather than influencing people to go outside and be active, sporting events encourage viewers to eat worse and sit and watch others being active. With influences such as the Olympic, which are supposed to shows a course of athletes all over the world competing, you would think they would be endorsing sponsors that would encourage a healthy diet. Sponsors such as McDonalds and Coca-Cola are very contradicting to the viewer as they are huge contributors to the obesity rate. Not only are the Olympics and World Cup sponsored by junk food companies, nearly every professional team in America is sponsored by one or more junk food company.
Medical News Today goes as far as saying that these sponsorships are a “direct attack on public health efforts” due to the large audience and information being displayed. Jeff Mochal, senior director of Global External Communications for McDonald's, has even stated, “We understand the importance of play in bringing families and friends together, and we provide access to all types of play through partnerships with various sporting associations. ” This completely contradicts itself due to the product they are still selling. They may have partnerships with sporting associations, however, they are also selling junk food to the families they are “bringing together. ”
In children and adolescents, brain growth is essential. Nutrition in Adolescence is a chapter out of Nutrition Guide for Physicians and Related Healthcare Professionals which is solely about the importance of nutrition in adolescents. This chapter shows more of the affects cognitively and how it can affect the development of your brain into adulthood. The adolescent period is essential due to the major physical and psychological changes that occur during that period. Apart from genetics, lifestyle behaviors can either increase or decrease the chances of diseases, especially dietary patterns. The HELENA Study, which was designed to assess the nutritional status of the adolescent population in Europe, looked into over 100, 000 adolescents to find the long term effects of nutrition factors in early life. The effect of poor nutrition in children may result in setbacks such as delayed cognitive, motor, and behavioral development.
‘Nutrition, Older Adulthood’ is a chapter in the Encyclopedia of Primary Prevention and Health Promotion that gives fact about the impact of a poor nutrition into adulthood and even gives onsite about how this will continue impacting us into old age. This chapter covers specifically the dangers of gaining diabetes and heart disease and how to raise or lower the chances of gaining it. This chapter describes the long-term effect of unhealthy nutrition choices into adulthood. Not only will this affect your appearance and risk to disease, it can also lead into mental health problems that can shorten a life. Robert W. Woodruff, a professor of International Nutrition in the Department of International Health in the Rollins School of Public Health of Emory University, studied the effects of poor nutrition in childhood into adulthood and found that the disadvantages in adults include “diminished intellectual performance, low work capacity, and increased risk of delivery complications. ” With the obesity rate at its highest, this become a critical subject to pay attention to. Since 2008, the rates of obesity in adults reached 1. 4 billion worldwide. This shows how fast habits can become out of control at young ages and grow to effect health and lifespan in adult life.
