Ban Fast Food Advertising Directed Essay

It is often said that 'we eat with our eyes' first, and children are no different. When hamburgers are in attractive packaging emblazoned with cartoon characters, children will want to eat the burgers more than broiled chicken and whole wheat pasta. Conversely, Cornell's Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs found that children eat more fruit when the fruit is displayed in attractive baskets rather than in stainless-steel buckets (Aubrey 2011). However, the presence of fast food offerings is too powerful to resist, even when fruit is present. In my own experience, I notice that when children beg to go to McDonald's, they show no interest in the healthier menu. One study of McDonald's located on hospital premises found: "When apple dippers and milk jugs were on the menu...families rarely ordered them. Apple dippers were purchased by anywhere from 0.3% to 3.6% of kids; milk from 1.1% to 6.6% of the time, depending on the age of the child. Almost no children purchased a yogurt parfait, apple juice or orange juice. On the other hand, French fries, soda, cheeseburgers, apple pie and the Big Mac were the most often-ordered items" (Parikh 2011).Fast food packs a super-sized marketing advantage: it has both cartoon characters and foods that suit children's preference for sweet, salty food on its side. These tastes imprint upon children early on, and fast food comes to have positive associations that spinach does not. The power of fast food is too great for busy, harried parents -- or baby sitters such as myself -- to resist when children beg for it. Fast food has no redeeming nutritional or social value. Cigarette advertising directed at children is already banned, because children lack the cognitive defenses to emotionally resist ads promoting this deadly product. Advertising promoting fast food should be banned as well.

Works Cited

Aubrey, Alison. "Cheap marketing techniques help kids choose more fruit." NPR.

October 3, 2011. [October 4, 2011] NPR. http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2011/10/03/141003800/cheap-marketing-techniques-help-kids-choose-more-fruit

"Fast food linked to child obesity." CBS. January 1, 2004. [October 4, 2011]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/05/health/main591325.shtml

Parikh, R. "Why children's hospitals tolerate McDonald's. September 19, 2011. Salon.

[October 4, 2011] http://life.salon.com/2011/09/19/poprx_mcdonalds/

"U.S. Obesity trends." Centers for Disease Control (CDC). [October….....