A Quali-Quantitative Analysis of Food Advertising in Italian Chilldren's National TV Programming: Implications for School- Based Nutrition Educational Programs

Globally it has been estimated that 10% of children and teens aged 6 to 18 are overweight or obese. An interesting analysis about the relationship between food and its consumer is offered by David Kessler who, described a new eating disorder he called conditioned hyperphagia. Food advertising is part of the problem of childhood obesity and WHO suggested to introduce changes, not only locally, but even in food industries, the media and advertising agencies , which are considered social organizations capable to playing a central role in both promoting and challenging childhood obesity. To have a better understandng of this problem in Italy, we investigated the quantity and the typology of advertising on air during childrens television programmes in Italy over a period of three months. During the research study, we analyzed all the TV programming targeting children aired in the six main TV national channels and studied the commercials during this programming. The paper will focus on the main results we obtained and will present suggestions to integrate traditional nutritional educational programs targeting children with components taken from the field of media education