Exploring the Interplay Between Message Format, Need for Cognition and Personal Relevance on Processing Messages About Physical Activity: a Two-Arm Randomized Experimental Trial.

Background: According to the Elaboration Likelihood Model, persuasion can occur via two different routes (the central route and peripheral route), with the route utilized dependent on factors associated with motivation and ability. This study aimed to explore the moderating role of need for cognition (NFC) and perceived relevance on the processing of physical activity messages designed to persuade via either the central route or the peripheral route.

Method: Participants (N = 50) were randomized to receive messages optimized for central route processing or messages optimized for peripheral route processing.

Can you elaborate on that? Addressing participants' need for cognition in computer-tailored health behavior interventions.

Computer-tailored interventions, which deliver health messages adjusted based on characteristics of the message recipient, can effectively improve a range of health behaviours. Typically, the content of the message is tailored to user demographics, health behaviours and social cognitive factors (e.g.

Factors associated with parents' attitudes to unhealthy foods and beverages.

Aim: Previous research has identified convenience, enjoyment, value for money and perceived goodness as primary dimensions of parents' attitudes to foods and beverages. The aim of the present study was to examine the factors associated with parents' scores on each of these attitudinal dimensions to identify key issues for future interventions designed to improve parents' food provision behaviours and children's diets.

Methods: A sample of 1302 Australian parents of children aged 8 to 14 years completed an online survey relating to their food-related beliefs.

Exploring the moderating effect of children's nutritional knowledge on the relationship between product evaluations and food choice.

Objective: Although the last decade has seen multiple attempts to increase consumers' nutritional knowledge in expectation that this will result in healthier diets, extant knowledge about the influence of nutritional knowledge on children's food choices remains scarce due to mixed empirical evidence and limited inquiry into the role of product evaluations on the consumption of less healthy foods. Furthermore, no research has examined whether nutritional knowledge can effectively moderate the relationship between product evaluations and food consumption, leaving a gap in our knowledge about potentially effective intervention strategies to curb childhood obesity.

Method: Using survey data from children aged 7-13 years and their parents (N = 354) recruited at an annual fair visited by families in South Australia, regressions were performed to examine how product evaluations are associated with the consumption of less healthy foods and whether nutritional knowledge reduces the strength of these associations at different ages (7-8 years, 9-10 years, and 11-13 years).

Food advertising, children's food choices and obesity: interplay of cognitive defences and product evaluation: an experimental study.

Objectives: To investigate the role of product evaluations, nutritional and persuasion knowledge on children's food choices conducted because of limited evidence about the role of product evaluations on consumer choices in conjunction with cognitive defences.

Design: A randomised controlled 2 × 2 factorial experiment with an exposure to a food and a control (toy) advertisement conducted in a non-laboratory setting at an annual event traditionally visited by families.

Subjects: Children aged 7-13 years with biometric/weight data representative of the general Australian population.