COLUMBUS – Parent often think they need superpowers to get their kids to eat vegetable, but a researcher at Ohio State says it looks they just need the help of some animated superheroes.
New research conducted by a team led by OSU assistant professor of human sciences Andrew Hanks found that marketing vegetables in school lunchrooms using the Super Sprowtz – a team of fun-loving characters with super powers – as much as tripled the percentage of elementary school students choosing items from the salad bar.
“If we put the time and good resources into marketing healthy choices to kids, it can work,” said Hanks, whose study appears in the journal Pediatrics.
Miki Mushroom, Zach Zucchini and Suzie Sweet Pea — featured characters on the YouTube show — appear to wield the kind of influence many moms and dads only wish they had.
Hanks and his collaborators conducted the study while he was at Cornell University and did tests in 10 public elementary schools.
In some cases, they wrapped the bottom portion of the salad bar with a vinyl banner depicting the super veggies. In others, they played Super Sprowtz videos in the lunch room.
In the schools with the salad bar banners, the researchers saw 24 percent of kids taking vegetables from the salad bars, almost double what they’d observed in the weeks leading up to the change.
In those schools that had characters on the salad bar and on video, veggie selection jumped from 10 percent to almost 35 percent. The researchers saw no significant improvement in schools with videos alone.
Though previous research has shown that boys are less likely than girls to choose healthier options, Hanks says his results were robust in both groups.