Community junior sport sponsorship: An online experiment assessing children's responses to unhealthy food v. pro-health sponsorship options

Abstract

Objective To explore children's responses to sponsorship of community junior sport by unhealthy food brands and investigate the utility of alternative, pro-health sponsorship options. Design Between-subjects experiment, with four sponsorship conditions: A, non-food branding (control); B, unhealthy food branding; C, healthier food branding; D, obesity prevention campaign branding. Setting Online experiment conducted in schools. Participants were shown a junior sports pack for their favourite sport that contained merchandise with branding representing their assigned sponsorship condition. Participants viewed and rated the sports pack, completed a distractor task, then completed questions asses..