Healthy Cooking Shows May Affect Your Kiddo’s Food Choice, According to New Study

Science says watching a healthy cooking show could have profound effects.

By Erica Loop January 30, 2020

Can what your child watches on TV affect their food choices? According to recent research, if your child watches a cooking program that features healthy foods, the answer is yes.

Research published in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior found a connection between watching healthy cooking shows and children’s food choices. The study, which included 125 children ages 10 through 12, may have found a way to get your kiddo to choose healthy snacks over chips, dip and cookies.

photo: AMSW Photography via Pexels

To better understand the impact cooking shows have on children and their food choices, the researchers asked some of the participants to watch clips of a Dutch cooking show (for kids) featuring healthy foods. The rest of the participants were asked to watch a a video featuring less healthy or unhealthy foods.

So how did the clips influence the kids’ food choices? Forty-one percent of the children in the healthy food clip group chose healthy foods when given a selection of snacks—but only 20 percent of the children who watched the unhealthy food video chose healthy snacks.

—Erica Loop

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