Parents who make virtuous food choices for their children are more lax for themselves. This is the conclusion of five field studies carried out in recent years in Australia and the Netherlands. Anika Schumacher, Assistant Professor of Marketing at Grenoble Ecole de Management, decodes these unexpected behaviors.

Why did you decide to work on this subject?

A.S: I started by observing my daily life. We are constantly making food choices, for ourselves and, if we are parents, for our children. But what guides these choices? There were no studies providing answers, even though it’s a key mechanism from a marketing and health point of view. I wanted to dig deeper into the subject. Even if it’s time-consuming and complex to set up a sample of parents and children, to bring them together simultaneously, etc., I’m convinced that it’s a good idea.

How old were the children you worked with?

The five studies took place in quite different settings, such as a kindergarten, a public swimming pool giving swimming lessons, a university… As a result, we worked with a wide range of age groups, from around 1 year old to 18. If we add the parents, we observed over 700 people.

Despite this diversity of profiles and contexts, the choice mechanism remains the same?

Exactly. Parents who choose healthy food for their children, whatever their age, are more lax for themselves. For example, in kindergarten, we used to ask them to choose grapes or jelly beans for their child’s snack. Then we’d suggest a chocolate tasting session. Parents who opted for grapes ate far more chocolate than those who didn’t!

Are these experiments representative of “real life”?

In our society, parents and children eat most of their meals separately. Parents are often forced to make these double choices. What’s more, another study revealed the same mechanism for reading.
We asked parents to choose a cookery book for their child: either healthy recipes, or recipes that were much less beneficial to health. Then we asked them to choose a magazine for themselves, ranging from celebrity magazines to scientific journals. The parents who chose the healthy cookbook for their child clearly preferred the entertainment press.

So, carefully choosing what to feed your children could have long-term negative consequences for parents’ health?

I’m a marketing researcher, not a nutrition and health researcher, so it’s impossible for me to draw such a conclusion. On the other hand, our studies show that the parents who pay the most attention to their children’s diet are attracted by products that are high in calories, fat, sugar, etc. If this behavior is repeated frequently, it could have a negative impact on the children’s health. If this behavior is repeated frequently, it’s problematic.

What do you suggest to counteract this trend?

Public authorities and image-conscious food companies could include educational messages for parents on the packaging of “virtuous” children’s food products, or offer them recipes for healthy dishes. Another possibility is online shopping: if I buy “good food” for children, the site suggests “good food” for adults.

Can we avoid this mechanism of differentiated choices within the family unit?

You can if you change the context. In one of our studies, we asked students to give their parents a gift voucher for two meals out, for Mother’s Day for example. The more young people choose a table that cooks “healthy” dishes, the more virtuously they behave themselves; they are the ones who eat the least chocolate if they are offered a tasting.

Parents can follow suit by suggesting to their children that when they buy them a restaurant, they choose one that combines flavor and health. It’s good for the whole family!