Fiction is Sweet. The Impact of Media Consumption on the Development of Children’s Nutritional Knowledge and the Moderating Role of Parental Food-Related Mediation. A Longitudinal Study

Nutritional knowledge is an important cognitive facilitator that potentially helps children to follow a healthy diet. Two main information agents influence children’s development of nutritional knowledge: the media and their parents. While a high amount of media consumption potentially decreases children’s nutritional knowledge, parents may shape the amount of information children can gather about nutrition through their food-related mediation styles. In addition, children’s individual preconditions predict how children can process the provided nutritional information. This two-wave panel study with children (N = 719; 5–11 years) and their parents (N = 719) investigated the main effects and interplay of children’s amount of media consumption and their parents’ food-related mediation styles by performing linear regression analysis. Children’s individual preconditions were also considered. We measured children’s self-reported amount of media consumption, children’s age, sex, weight, and height (BMI). Additionally, in a parent survey we asked parents about how they communicate their rules about eating while especially focusing on active and restrictive food rule communication styles. As a dependent measure, we examined children’s nutritional knowledge at Time 1 and 2. The results show that the amount of media consumption has a negative effect on children’s nutritional knowledge over time. Parents’ restrictive or active food-related mediation asserted no main effects and could not lever out the negative effect of the amount of media consumption. Therefore, we argue that parents should limit children’s amount of media consumption to avoid the manifestation of misperceptions about nutrition.

The effects of gain- and loss-framed nutritional messages on children’s healthy eating behaviour

Objective:Despite extensive research on framing effects in public health communication, there is still a lack of knowledge on how gain frames v. loss frames can encourage healthy eating behaviour among children.Design:Drawing on the Prospect Theory as well as on the Reactivity of Embedded Food Cues in Advertising Model, an experiment exposed children to an audio-visual cartoon movie with gain-framed nutritional messages about eating fruit (gain condition), loss-framed nutritional messages about eating fruit (loss condition) or a message without any food (control group). Children’s fruit intake was measured as the dependent variable. Children’s awareness of gain- and loss-framed arguments was treated as mediators, while children’s age and parents’ self-reported food-related mediation styles were modelled as moderators.Setting:Vienna, Austria, in 2018.Participants:Children aged 6–10 years (N 161).Results:Children in the gain frame group were more aware of gain-framed arguments, and children in the loss frame group were more aware of loss-framed arguments than those in the control group. However, only the mediator awareness of gain-framed arguments increased fruit intake. Additionally, there was a direct effect of the gain-framed message on fruit intake compared to the control group. The loss condition did not reveal such an effect. Neither parent’s food-related mediation styles nor children’s age moderated those results.Conclusion:Gain-framing seems to be more effective in influencing children’s healthy food choices compared to loss-framing. Implications for health communication strategies aimed at children are discussed.

EU Mediation in Egypt: The Limits of Reactive Conflict Management

This article reviewsEU’s mediation attempts in Egypt between 2011 and 2013. After presenting the main challenges and opportunities ofEUmediation in the Middle East-North Africa (MENA) neighborhood,EUinterventions in Egypt are discussed in relation to the 25 January 2011 revolution, during the presidency of Mohammed Morsi, and after the 3 July 2013 coup d’état, focusing specifically on the choice of mediation styles and their timing. It is argued that three contextual conditions that are typical of the crises that erupt during failed democratic transitions – their fast pace, their eminently domestic nature and significant power asymmetries between the main parties involved – exacerbate the structural problems that theEUfaces when intervening in countries that are not current or potential candidates for accession. The analysis ofEUmediation styles during Egypt’s transition provides a critical perspective onEU’s foreign policy making after the Treaty of Lisbon.