By Meredith Wise
If you put a carrot and a cookie in front of a child, which do you think most will pick? Self-control in the face of sugary goodness as an adult can be tough. And for kids, it’s even harder.
Childhood obesity is a massive epidemic in the United States―nearly one in three children and teens are overweight or obese. Foundations and others across the country are pouring money into eliminating the issue: The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation alone has set aside $1 billion just for that purpose.
But before we spend that money, it might be helpful to know that a series of talks at the Society for Personality and Social Psychology’s 16th Annual Meeting in Long Beach, California, suggested that commonly used strategies for convincing children to eat healthier may not be as effective as we think.
“Cafeterias have a problem,” said Dr. Traci Mann. “Vegetables lose to everything.” She pointed out that on a typical lunch tray, vegetables are competing with all the other components of the meal: the entrees, other side dishes and, in some cases, dessert.
In her talk, Mann suggested that instead of focusing on encouraging kids to show self-control and put the cookie down, perhaps instead there should be a focus on getting kids to eat more vegetables. But how?
“We need to put the vegetable in a contest it can win,” Mann explained.
Mann’s research found that a nudge-type strategy – one in which slight changes to the environment (without removing options) make a particular behavior more likely – can be quite effective. For example, in several of Mann’s studies, elementary students were offered a veggie before their main meal. Overall, they found that this “veggies first” approach tripled the amount of vegetables that children consumed.
Another commonly used strategy to encourage healthy eating in children is the inclusion of health and nutrition classes in a school’s curriculum. As Dr. Christopher Bryan noted in another talk, these types of classes have not typically been successful in producing sustainable behaviors. While the idea of classroom interventions aren’t new, his research is a fresh attempt to hone in on strategies than can create a real, lasting change in healthy eating behaviors.
Instead of focusing solely on teaching students about the benefits of and the science behind healthy eating, which are of course important, Bryan’s research suggests that reframing the conversation to include values that are more relatable for them may be a better strategy. For example, appealing to ideas like rebelling against authority or the drive to define a positive identity. In other words, making it “cool” to identify as a healthy eater.
To test this hypothesis, Bryan and colleagues directed eighth grade students in Texas to read either an exposé-style article about the shady side of the food industry (think: what food executives do behind closed doors and how their marketing strategies target the poor) or a more traditional nutrition article on food labelling and recommendations for a balanced diet. The exposé put students in the mindset that eating healthy foods was a way to “stick it to the man” who was trying to push unhealthy options onto them.
The researchers then measured the construal of healthy eating, and not surprisingly, those who were directed to read the exposé article saw healthy eating as more autonomous and prosocial. The results also suggest that the team was actually able to increase the appeal of healthy eating as an identity.
Even before the students knew they were to be participants in the study, their principal announced that they would be receiving snack packs as a treat for completing their state standardized tests. Bryan’s studies took place between that initial announcement and the time for students to choose the contents of their snack pack.
Encouragingly, the rates of healthy choices among students who read the exposé article nearly tripled those of the students who read the control article. In this case, a healthy choice was considered choosing water over a sugary drink and at least one healthy snack option—for example, fruit instead of a cookie.
Most researchers would agree that there is no one silver bullet that will reverse the childhood obesity epidemic. But taken together, these works offer hope that understanding more about strategies that work, even those that challenge conventional wisdom, can lead to a sustainable solution.