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Date Submitted: 03/03/2013 06:40 AM
Priming Effects of Television Food Advertising on Eating Behavior
Jennifer L. Harris, John A. Bargh, and Kelly D. Brownell
Yale University
Objective: Health advocates have focused on the prevalence of advertising for calorie-dense low-nutrient
foods as a significant contributor to the obesity epidemic. This research tests the hypothesis that exposure
to food advertising during TV viewing may also contribute to obesity by triggering automatic snacking of
available food. Design: In Experiments 1a and 1b, elementary-school-age children watched a cartoon that
contained either food advertising or advertising for other products and received a snack while watching.
In Experiment 2, adults watched a TV program that included food advertising that promoted snacking
and/or fun product benefits, food advertising that promoted nutrition benefits, or no food advertising. The
adults then tasted and evaluated a range of healthy to unhealthy snack foods in an apparently separate
experiment. Main Outcome Measures: Amount of snack foods consumed during and after advertising
exposure. Results: Children consumed 45% more when exposed to food advertising. Adults consumed
more of both healthy and unhealthy snack foods following exposure to snack food advertising compared
to the other conditions. In both experiments, food advertising increased consumption of products not in
the presented advertisements, and these effects were not related to reported hunger or other conscious
influences. Conclusion: These experiments demonstrate the power of food advertising to prime automatic
eating behaviors and thus influence far more than brand preference alone.
Keywords: food advertising, priming, eating behavior, children, obe