By JOHN NAISH

They seem such innocent fun. Brightly coloured websites crowd the internet offering free games and featuring engaging cartoon characters.

What better way to keep the kids happily entertained? Child health experts see it differently.

They warn that such sites are often run by fast-food chains and makers of sugar-packed cereals and sweets whose sole intention is to sell more junk food.

They use subtle messages to encourage youngsters to crave their produce. And it works.

Brightly coloured children’s websites are often run by fast-food chains and makers of sugar-packed cereals and sweets whose sole intention is to sell more junk food

Dutch research last year found that children who play an internet game featuring a subtle food advertisement subsequently eat more than 50 per cent more sweets straight afterwards than children who play the game without the advert.

The investigator, Dr Frans Folkvord, a psychologist at Radboud University in the Netherlands, who studied the habits of more than 1,000 children says that every week two-thirds of primary school children play online games that ply sweets and other unhealthy snacks.

Meanwhile the latest figures reveal a fifth of four to five-year-olds are overweight or obese, while over 35 per cent of 11 to 15-year-olds fall into this category.

Adverts disguised as children’s online games are called ‘advergames’.

They work by the power of suggestion, motivating children to pester parents, or go behind their backs to buy advertised foods.

Research such as Dr Folkvord’s compelled experts at the World Health Organisation (WHO) last month to urge tighter controls on junk food advertising to children via the internet, phone apps, and social-media such as Facebook and Instagram.

Dr Zsuzsanna Jakab, the WHO’s regional director for Europe, says: ‘Often, parents do not see the same advertisements, nor do they observe their children’s online activities.’

Last week the Committee on Advertising Practice announced new rules banning junk food marketing aimed at the under-16s.

That means branding such as the Ronald McDonald clown may need to be scrapped. But the new clampdown is unlikely to impact on advergames.

For while TV and magazine adverts are regulated to prevent subliminal persuasion, online children’s ads are not independently regulated in the UK.

And youngsters are especially vulnerable to this approach.

When they play an advergame, their conscious brains are occupied with winning — while the junk food branding messages slip into their subconscious brains.

Their subconscious then makes the link: ‘Brand X equals fun and excitement.’

Psychologists call this the ‘mere exposure’ effect — being exposed to a brand logo in an enjoyable context makes a child crave the brand by association.

Professor Agnes Nairn, a specialist in marketing, ethics and the wellbeing of children at Hult International Business School in London, explains: ‘Children are unaware of these messages going unprocessed into their brains because all of their cognitive resources are taken up with playing the online game.

‘Many large companies employ neuroscientists to develop such strategies.’

Advergames can also persuade children that junk foods are actually going to improve their physiques.

For example, research in the Journal of Consumer Policy in 2013 found that when children played an advergame for the milk-flavouring brand Nesquik — where a cartoon bunny jumped higher after consuming the product — they were prone to thinking that it ‘made you fit’.

Similarly, a 2014 study in the International Journal of Advertising found that children aged between five and seven who played an advergame pushing a sugary cereal were significantly more likely to believe the cereal would make them healthy.

And while a TV advert only exposes children to a product for 30 seconds at a time, an advergame can be played for hours — which embeds the marketing messages in their minds through constant repetition.

But there is another more chilling element to this.

Children with smartphones can download free gaming apps provided by fast-food companies.

When they do, the apps enable advertisers to track the children’s whereabouts using GPS satellite-tracking.

Dr Emma Boyland, a lecturer in appetite and obesity at the University of Liverpool, and a co-author of the WHO report, warns this technology enables advertisers to tell if a child is near a fast-food restaurant, and to send them advertising and offers to lure them in.

Experts call this tactic ‘ultra-targeting’, and it can transmit messages to the phones of children within two miles of restaurants.

The U.S. National Policy And Legal Analysis Network To Prevent Childhood Obesity warns: ‘Cravings can now be easily triggered at the exact point when a teen is near a fast-food restaurant, made even more irresistible through a variety of incentives such as coupons, discounts, and free offers.’

Junk food advertisers even use computer systems to track individual children’s moods — as indicated by the words they use on social media sites such as Facebook — and send ads to their online addresses when they seem low or hungry.

Yet not everyone is convinced of the harm of this advertising.

Professor Nairn adds: ‘Many parents don’t see it as a problem because they merely think that their children are being entertained.’

Source: Mail Online