Funder: Yale University Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity

With Support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation the Rudd Center at Yale University is embarking on an ambitious food marketing project to identify the best and worst food practices, assess their impact on children and youth, and inform policy makers and the public about how the practices and their effects.

Monitoring Opinion Pages and the Trade Press
BMSG is contributing to the Rudd Center's project by conducting an ongoing, prospective assessment of how food marketing issues are portrayed on opinion pages, including masthead editorials, columns, op-eds, letters to the editor, selected trade press, and selected blogs. BMSG's previous studies have revealed how messages have been framed, by whom, with what intent, and signiciantly, how they have changed over time. Through the Rudd Center, BMSG will publish and disseminate brief analyses of the opinon tracking so advocates can learn where they stand in the continuum of debate, what to expect from opponents, and how to reframe issues.

Content Analysis of Food and Beverage Web Sites Targeting Children
BMSG is also conducting a series of Internet content analysis. Children are spending more time online, and from a very early age, visiting Web sites designed especially for them. According to a Februry 2008 report on the "U.S. Online Population," children between the ages of 8 and 14 are online almost 2 hours daily.

The online presence of children is not going unnoticed by food and beverage marketers. The top food and beverage marketers have branded Web sites designed to appeal to children, chock full of activities and features-games, videos, contests, email, personal profiles, and more-designed to engage children with the brand for prolonged periods.

Based on its recent study of the top 30 most popular children's Web sites in 2006, BMSG is conducting a content analysis of food marketing targeting children on Web sites sponsered by food companies and others. BMSG will study one category each year (cereal, fast food, and sweetened beverages). The focus of the research will be on cataloguing the brands being marketed and the techniques marketers use online. The analysis will assess the level of engagement food marketers are employing to keep children interacting with their brands.

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