The Influence of Televised Food Commercials on Children's Food Choices: Evidence from Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex Activations.

OBJECTIVE: To investigate how food commercials influence children's food choices. STUDY DESIGN: Twenty-three children ages 8-14 years provided taste and health ratings for 60 food items. Subsequently, these children were scanned with the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging while making food choices (ie, "eat" or "not eat") after watching food and nonfood television commercials. RESULTS: Our results show that watching food commercials changes the way children consider the importance of taste when making food choices. Children did not use health values for their food choices, indicating children's decisions were largely driven by hedonic, immediate rewards (ie, "tastiness"); however, children placed significantly more importance on taste after watching food commercials compared with nonfood commercials. This change was accompanied by faster decision times during food commercial trials. The ventromedial prefrontal cortex, a reward valuation brain region, showed increased activity during food choices after watching food commercials compared with after watching nonfood commercials. CONCLUSION: Overall, our results suggest watching food commercials before making food choices may bias children's decisions based solely on taste, and that food marketing may systematically alter the psychological and neurobiologic mechanisms of children's food decisions.

Brain responses to food logos in obese and healthy weight children.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate brain activation in response to common food and nonfood logos in healthy weight and obese children. STUDY DESIGN: Ten healthy weight children (mean body mass index in the 50th percentile) and 10 obese children (mean body mass index in the 97.9th percentile) completed self-report measures of self-control. They then underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while viewing food and nonfood logos. RESULTS: Compared with the healthy weight children, obese children showed significantly less brain activation to food logos in the bilateral middle/inferior prefrontal cortex, an area involved in cognitive control. CONCLUSION: When shown food logos, obese children showed significantly less brain activation than the healthy weight children in regions associated with cognitive control. This provides initial neuroimaging evidence that obese children may be more vulnerable to the effects of food advertising.