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- In a study of YouTube videos of the biggest influencers kids, 90% of food and drinks were unhealthy branded items.
- Promoting junk food in children’s videos could lead to a lifetime of unhealthy eating, obesity, and related health problems.
- The study authors called for stricter regulations on product placement on YouTube videos with children.
- Visit the Insider home page for more stories.
The highest paid YouTube star of 2019 is a 9-year-old boy named Ryan Kaji. Among his most popular videos are a Chuck E Cheese walkthrough, a McDonald’s pretend game, and a review of giant Chupa Chups lollipops.
Children’s channels like Ryan’s World, which has nearly 27 million subscribers, generate millions of impressions of unhealthy food and beverage brands, according to a study published today in the journal Pediatrics.
Researchers at New York University’s School of Global Public Health analyzed YouTube videos of the five most-viewed influential children on the site. They counted food and beverage appearances, scored brands, and assessed nutritional content.
Not all branded products were associated with sponsorships, but for young children, there may not be a difference between sponsored content and regular YouTube videos, study author Marie Bragg told Insider.
“The worrying thing is, for young children and kids who are watching this, it may not matter that sometimes it’s paid sponsorship and sometimes it’s not,” said Bragg, assistant professor in NYU’s department of population health. . “It can work just like advertising and promote poor eating behaviors.”
90% of the foods and beverages in the videos were unhealthy brand name snacks.
Bragg and his colleagues analyzed 179 videos featuring food and drinks, which together garnered more than 1 billion views and 2.6 million likes.
The vast majority, just over 90%, of the foods and beverages in these videos were unhealthy branded products. McDonald’s accounted for 30% of brand-name product placements, and other major brands included Hershey’s, Kinder, and M & M’s.
Unhealthy products of any particular brand, such as hot dogs, accounted for 4% of the foods and beverages featured in the videos, and healthy branded and non-branded products accounted for the remaining 6%.
Promoting junk food to kids can lead to obesity and other health problems
Kids who see influencers promoting unhealthy foods are more likely to overeat and eat junk food in particular, another study in Pediatrics found.
In the long term, obese children are more likely to remain obese into adulthood, which can lead to additional health problems.
“We have the opportunity to prepare them for health or prepare them for a diet that will put them at risk for diabetes, heart disease, and other poor health outcomes,” Bragg said. “Because many times, the weight gain that occurs in childhood or adolescence persists into adulthood.”
Children are especially susceptible to stealth marketing
Studies have shown that children under the age of eight cannot distinguish between commercials and cartoons, and that was when advertising was primarily on television.
Today, more than 80% of parents with children 12 and under allow their children to watch YouTube, and regulations have not been updated. Presenter selling, where the main character of a television show endorses a product in a commercial, is not allowed on television, Bragg said, but influencers can similarly advertise on YouTube.
“Especially when they see the children in their peer group using these products and drinking these drinks, playing with these toys, it is even more compelling for them because they see it as a social part,” Nicole Beurkens, child psychologist and nutritionist who was not affiliated with the studio, he told Insider.
The study authors asked the Federal Trade Commission to enact stricter regulations to address unhealthy food and drink brands promoted by influential kids, but Beurkens said some of the regulation will have to fall on parents.
“Parents need to be aware of, monitor and communicate with children about what they consume, particularly on a platform like YouTube,” Beurkens said.
Read more:
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