Restrictions will ban TV advertising of junk food products before 9pm (Image: Getty)
Just five minutes of exposure to junk food advertising leads to children eating significantly more calories during a day — even if the ads do not feature any food products, research reveals. Youngsters who watched, listened to, or looked at adverts for foods high in saturated fat, sugar and salt typically consumed around 130 more calories, equivalent to two slices of bread.
The effect was the same for content featuring specific food products or with only branding, such as logos for companies like McDonald's, KFC and Burger King. Experts warned that the study exposed a serious loophole in the Government’s planned ban on junk food TV adverts before 9pm, which comes into force in October. Research leader Emma Boyland, a professor of food marketing and child health at the University of Liverpool, said: “This is the first study to show that brand-only food advertising affects what children eat.
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“We also showed that children don’t just eat more immediately following food advertising, they actually ate more at the lunch meal as well, a couple of hours after they had seen the advertising.”
The five minutes of exposure were “much less than children would typically be seeing on a normal day”, Prof Boyland said.
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She added: “That’s a substantial uplift in calorie intake that, if repeated over time, would clearly lead to weight gain in young people.”
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The study involved 240 children aged seven to 15 at schools in Merseyside. On two different occasions, they were shown five minutes of food-related and non-food adverts.
After each exposure, they were offered snacks such as grapes or chocolate buttons, and, a while later, trays of lunch food with savoury, sweet and healthy items.
Children ate 58 calories more in snacks and 73 calories more at lunchtime after being exposed to junk food adverts.
Prof Boyland said: “The foods that we served them weren’t the same foods that were shown in the advertisements, and were presented with no branding information.
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“So it wasn’t that they were driven to buy the particular food or go and consume fast food, it was just a prompt to consume what was available.”
The effect was stronger for children with a higher body mass index, with participants consuming an additional 17 calories for every unit increase in BMI.
And it was consistent across four different types of content: video with sound, visual (e.g. social media posts), audio (e.g. a podcast advert), and static images (e.g. posters or billboards).
Prof Boyland, who will present the findings at the European Congress on Obesity in Malaga, Spain, this week, said: “It raises the question: are we doing enough in terms of regulation to restrict advertising in those spaces as well?”
The Government confirmed in December that a 9pm watershed will be introduced for TV adverts featuring junk food products, along with restrictions on paid online adverts.
It claimed the measures would prevent thousands of cases of childhood obesity by removing around 7.2 billion calories per year from the diets of UK children.
Prof Boyland said the Advertising Standards Authority had yet to set out final guidance but brand-only advertising is expected to be exempt.
Such content is becoming increasingly popular. Prof Boyland added: “This research suggests that we need to look at what’s happening in the media and advertising trends, and that is certainly towards a greater emphasis on brands and creating positive associations with attributes like happiness, positive emotions and so on.
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“It might be that once we get this policy implemented in October, a future iteration should be considering how to incorporate brand-only advertising.”
Katharine Jenner, director of the Obesity Health Alliance, said the study must send “a clear message to policymakers: food advertising is driving excess calorie intake in children”.
She added: “From October, new restrictions will limit unhealthy food adverts on TV before 9pm and online at any time — a vital step forward that will protect children from the worst offenders.
“But loopholes remain. Brands will still be able to advertise to young people even without showing specific products, on billboards and at bus stops, and children living with overweight or obesity are especially vulnerable.
“Small reductions in calorie intake can lead to meaningful improvements in children’s health.
“If the government is serious about ending junk food advertising to children, they must close the loopholes that will allow companies to keep bombarding them.”
Dr Helen Stewart, officer for health improvement at the Royal College of Paediatric and Child Health, said reducing children’s exposure to unhealthy food advertising was “a crucial step in curbing rising obesity levels”.
She added: “Childhood obesity is stubbornly high, with children in the most deprived areas facing rates more than twice as high as their peers.
“Paediatricians recognise that tackling this crisis is impossible without also introducing necessary measures such as regulations on the food industry.
“We call on the Government to implement the junk food marketing ban as planned, and without further delay.”
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The Government had said that brand advertising which does not identify less healthy products will be exempt from restrictions to avoid pigeon-holing brands.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said the planned restrictions will "reduce the number living with obesity by 20,000, and deliver health benefits to the economy worth ￡2 billion".
They added: “We are encouraging the industry to focus on healthier options, by allowing companies to advertise healthier alternatives in identified categories."