Impact of a youth-led social marketing intervention run by adolescents to encourage healthy lifestyles among younger school peers (EYTO-Kids project): a parallel-cluster randomised controlled pilot study

Abstract

BackgroundEncouraging healthy lifestyles in children is a challenge. This project aimed to improve lifestyles of younger peers by engaging adolescent creators (ACs) to design and implement peer-led and social marketing (SM) health-promoting activities.MethodsA 10-month parallel-cluster randomised controlled school-based pilot study was performed in disadvantaged neighbourhoods in Reus (Spain) spanning two academic years (2015–2016/2016–2017). Eight primary schools (n=375 children) and four high schools (n=94ACs) were randomly placed in the intervention group. The 94 ACs (12–14 years) designed and implemented four SM activities for their younger peers (9–11 years). Eight primary schools (n=327 children) and three high schools (n=98 adolescents) served as the control group and received no intervention. Primary (physical activity and fruit consumption) and secondary outcomes (screen time, vegetables, soft drinks, sweets and fast food consumptions) were assessed with validated questionnaires at baseline and at the end of the study.ResultsAfter 10 months, fruit consumption and physical activity were maintained in the children who consumed ≥1 fruit/day and spent ≥6 hours/week physical activity. However, compared with the controls, the intervention significantly increased the physical activity of girls to 15.6 min/week, whereas the percentage of girls who consumed sweets, soft drinks and fast food decreased significantly by 8.4%, 14.5% and 5.9%, respectively. Additionally, the percentage of ≥2 hour/weekday of screen time by boys decreased significantly by 8.2%.ConclusionThe European Youth Tackling Obesity-Kids, SM and peer-led intervention, effectively increased physical activity hours/week in girls, but was not effective in improving the percentage of children who consumed the recommended fruit. Moreover, the percentages of girls who consumed sweets, soft drinks and fast food and boys screen time decreased.Trial registration numberNCT02702336; Pre-results.

Shifting From Tokenism to Meaningful Adolescent Participation in Research for Obesity Prevention: A Systematic Scoping Review

“…Improvements in physical activity and fitness behaviors were reported in 12 studies ( 54 , 93 , 96 , 101 , 105 , 126 , 142 , 149 , 161 , 164 , 165 , 169 ), five of these involved an RCT ( 101 , 142 , 164 , 165 , 169 ), seven employed a collaborative ( 54 , 93 , 96 , 105 , 161 , 165 , 169 ) mode of adolescent participation and seven involved a peer-component ( 93 , 96 , 105 , 126 , 149 , 164 , 169 ).…”

“…Encouraging changes in dietary behaviors were reported in 17 studies, as an improvement in dietary intake or nutrition behaviors ( 61 , 91 , 96 , 101 , 105 , 112 , 126 , 149 , 161 , 164 , 165 , 169 ), increased fruit ( 93 ) and vegetable consumption ( 121 ), reduced caloric intake ( 99 ), reduction in sugar sweetened beverage intake ( 108 ) or an increase in water consumption ( 54 ). Overall studies involving improvements in dietary behaviors had in common that they were more likely to be collaborative (9/17) ( 54 , 91 , 93 , 96 , 105 , 108 , 161 , 165 , 169 ) and involve a peer-component (10/17) ( 61 , 91 , 93 , 96 , 105 , 108 , 126 , 149 , 164 , 169 ). Studies which reported an improvement in dietary behaviors were almost evenly of qualitative (7/17) ( 54 , 93 , 105 , 112 , 121 , 126 , 149 ) or RCT (6/17) design ( 91 , 101 , 108 , 164 , 165 , 169 ).…”

The Role of Recreational Online Activities in School-Based Screen Time Sedentary Behaviour Interventions for Adolescents: A Systematic and Critical Literature Review

“…The search resulted in 2583 items (see flow diagram in Fig. 1), and identified 30 published papers analysing 15 intervention studies (12 registered RCTs, three pre-post designs) that met the criteria for inclusion in the review (Aittasalo et al 2019;Andrade et al 2014Andrade et al , 2015Babic et al 2016;Babic et al 2015;Bagherniya et al 2018;Barbosa Filho et al 2019;Barbosa Filho et al 2016;Barbosa Filho et al 2015;Cui et al 2012;Foley et al 2017;Hamulka et al 2018;Hankonen et al 2016Hankonen et al , 2017Jussila et al 2015;Leme et al 2016;Leme and Philippi 2015;Lubans et al 2016a;Lubans et al 2016b;Majumdar et al 2013;Singh et al 2006Singh et al , 2009Singh et al , 2007Smith et al 2017;Smith et al 2014aSmith et al , 2014bTarro et al 2017, Tarro et al 2019Vik et al 2015;Wadolowska et al 2019). Out of the 15 studies, eight were analysed in more than one paper, presenting a separate rationale/study protocol or protocol and baseline results and additional effectiveness of RCT papers ( Table 1).…”

“…The opposite was found in Manjumdar et al's study (2019), with significant effects for the other intervention objectives (sweetened beverages and snacks) and no changes for ST. Positive intervention effects with increased percentages in those meeting daily recommendations for duration of watching TV and computer use were found in the studies by Barbosa Filho et al (2019) and Tarro et al (2019). The Singh et al (2009) study reported ST reduction for boys 20 months post intervention.…”

Sociocultural Influences on Dietary Practices and Physical Activity Behaviors of Rural Adolescents—A Qualitative Exploration

“…This highlights the necessity of supportive school food environment for enabling adolescents to make healthy choices. Promising avenues in this regard range from peer-led nutrition promotion program, school meal program or subsidized canteens serving healthy foods, regulation of food vending within and beyond school boundaries and so forth [79][80][81]. Like the neighboring country India, schools in Bangladesh are yet to define and adopt school food policies, whereas many Western countries have that in place [82].…”