Publications by authors named "Virginia Natero"

Objective: Examine the key elements that characterise social media advertisements targeted at adolescents by asking adolescents which features of Instagram ads promoting ultra-processed products make them designed to appeal to adolescents.

Design: Instagram ads promoting ultra-processed products and brands were selected from a database in which ads had been classified regarding whether they were primarily targeted at adolescents from an adult perspective. Adolescents completed a sorting task in small groups and were requested to reach a consensus through discussions and sticky notes regarding whether sixty ads were designed to appeal to them.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: To evaluate the prevalence of health-related cues as part of the digital marketing of ultraprocessed foods on Instagram among food companies in Uruguay.

Methods: Cross-sectional exploratory study. All content posted by 118 Instagram accounts of companies promoting ultraprocessed foods in Uruguay over 6 months (from August 2020 to February 2021) was retrieved.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Nutritional warnings have gained popularity, particularly in the region of the Americas, to facilitate the identification of products with excessive content of nutrients associated with non-communicable diseases and encourage healthier food choices. Although warnings have been shown to be effective, an in-depth understanding of the reasons why some consumers do not use them is still lacking. The aim of the present work was to explore self-reported use of nutritional warnings and to identify the reasons for not considering nutritional warnings for making food purchase decisions after policy implementation in Uruguay.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Digital marketing has seen a rapid rise in the last decade as a consequence of the increased popularity of social media. However, few studies so far have analyzed the prevalence and persuasive power of digital marketing of ultra-processed products. The present study aimed at: (i) analyzing the content of Instagram posts of ultra-processed products through the lens of the heuristic-systematic model, and (ii) evaluating the influence of the content of the posts on user interactions.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Adolescents are particularly vulnerable to digital food marketing. However, research on adolescents' recall, awareness, and opinions of this type of marketing is still scarce. Accordingly, the present study aimed to conduct an in-depth examination of adolescents' experiences with digital food marketing.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF

Objective: To describe the magnitude and distribution of malnutrition in all forms (stunting, wasting, overweight and obesity) by level of education and socio-economic status (SES).

Design: Representative data from three national surveys were used: the socio-economic characteristics of Uruguayan households the 2012-2013; the Survey of Child Health, Nutrition and Development and the Survey of Chronic Disease Risks. We defined overweight, obesity, wasting/underweight and stunting/short stature according to WHO criteria.

View Article and Find Full Text PDF