An objective methodology capturing online commodity marketing and other harms.

Increasingly life is lived online, yet little is known about the actual nature and extent of online content that people view due to the difficulty of recording real time exposure. This includes people's exposure to harmful commodity marketing. This study aimed to develop a methodology to assess the nature and extent of exposure to, and engagement with, unhealthy commodity marketing and other public health harms online, particularly children's exposure. A convenience sample of 16 young adult participants (aged 21-29) recorded their device usage for 2 days using Zoom software. Data were coded and analysed to assess the nature and extent of marketing for alcohol, gambling, junk food and smoking products. Four focus groups were conducted with participants to explore their data collection and coding experiences, and results assessed using thematic analysis. The study found that, with some modifications, this method was feasible for gathering real-time objective data from the online world that can be analysed for a range of public health harms, including marketing of unhealthy commodities. Larger studies are recommended to build global evidence for public health action in the online world.

Sleep patterns in children differ by ethnicity: cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses using actigraphy.

OBJECTIVES: To determine whether sleep patterns (duration, timing, efficiency) differ by ethnicity. DESIGN: Longitudinal study. SETTING: Dunedin, New Zealand. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 939 children (48% male) aged 4-12 years (572 European, 181 Maori, 111 Pacific, 75 Asian). MEASUREMENTS: All measurements were obtained at months 0, 12, and 24. Anthropometry was obtained using standard techniques, and parents completed questionnaires assessing demographics, dietary intake, and television habits of children. Sleep and physical activity were measured using Actigraph accelerometers over 1 week. Differences in sleep outcomes according to ethnicity were adjusted for demographics, weight status, and behavioral variables using mixed models. RESULTS: Pacific children had greater body mass index and were more likely to live in deprived areas than children from other ethnic groups (all P<.001), but few differences were observed in behavioral variables. Pacific Island children slept 16 (95% confidence interval, 7-25) minutes less per night than New Zealand European children, predominantly as a result of later bedtimes (29; 20-38 minutes). By contrast, sleep efficiency did not differ by ethnicity or over time (all P≥.118). Maori children did not show the same relative deficits in sleep, displaying similar results to European children. Sleep duration decreased by 8 minutes (95% confidence interval, 6-10) a night each year over 2 years, and change over time did not differ by ethnicity (all P≥.165). CONCLUSIONS: From a young age, Pacific children had poorer sleep patterns than European children, and these patterns were maintained over 2 years.