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  • Impact of a youth-led social marketing intervention run by adolescents to encourage healthy lifestyles among younger school peers (EYTO-Kids project): a parallel-cluster randomised controlled pilot study

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Research report
Impact of a youth-led social marketing intervention run by adolescents to encourage healthy lifestyles among younger school peers (EYTO-Kids project): a parallel-cluster randomised controlled pilot study
  1. Lucia Tarro1,2,
  2. Elisabet Llauradó1,
  3. Magaly Aceves-Martins1,
  4. David Moriña3,
  5. Ignasi Papell-Garcia2,
  6. Lluis Arola2,4,
  7. Montse Giralt1,5,
  8. Rosa Solà1,2,6
  1. 1 Medicine and Surgery and Basical Medical Sciences, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Facultat de Medicina i Ciències de la Salut, Functional Nutrition, Oxidation, and Cardiovascular Diseases Group (NFOC-Salut), Health Education and Promotion, C/ Sant Llorenç, 21, Reus (43201), Spain, Reus, Spain
  2. 2 Health and Nutrition, Eurecat, Centre Tecnològic de Catalunya, Unitat de Nutrició i Salut, Avinguda Universitat 1, Reus, Catalonia, Spain
  3. 3 Infections and Cancer-Information and Interventions, Unit of Infections and Cancer-Information and Interventions (UNIC-I&I), Catalan Institute of Oncology (ICO)-IDIBELL, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
  4. 4 Bioquímica i Biotecnologia, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Departament de Bioquímica i Biotecnologia, Nutrigenomics Research Group, Campus Sescelades C/ Marcel·lí Domingo, 1 43007 Tarragona, Tarragona, Catalonia, Spain
  5. 5 Pharmacology, Universitat Rovira i Virgili Facultat de Medicina I Ciences de la Salut, C/ Sant Llorenç, 21, Reus (43201), Spain, Reus, Catalonia, Spain
  6. 6 Internal Medicine, Hospital Universitari Sant Joan de Reus, Avinguda Bellissens, 2, 43204 Reus, Spain, Reus, Catalunya, Spain
  1. Correspondence to Dr Elisabet Llauradó; elisabet.llaurado{at}urv.cat

Abstract

Background Encouraging healthy lifestyles in children is a challenge. This project aimed to improve lifestyles of younger peers by engaging adolescent creators (ACs) to design and implement peer-led and social marketing (SM) health-promoting activities.

Methods A 10-month parallel-cluster randomised controlled school-based pilot study was performed in disadvantaged neighbourhoods in Reus (Spain) spanning two academic years (2015–2016/2016–2017). Eight primary schools (n=375 children) and four high schools (n=94ACs) were randomly placed in the intervention group. The 94 ACs (12–14 years) designed and implemented four SM activities for their younger peers (9–11 years). Eight primary schools (n=327 children) and three high schools (n=98 adolescents) served as the control group and received no intervention. Primary (physical activity and fruit consumption) and secondary outcomes (screen time, vegetables, soft drinks, sweets and fast food consumptions) were assessed with validated questionnaires at baseline and at the end of the study.

Results After 10 months, fruit consumption and physical activity were maintained in the children who consumed ≥1 fruit/day and spent ≥6 hours/week physical activity. However, compared with the controls, the intervention significantly increased the physical activity of girls to 15.6 min/week, whereas the percentage of girls who consumed sweets, soft drinks and fast food decreased significantly by 8.4%, 14.5% and 5.9%, respectively. Additionally, the percentage of ≥2 hour/weekday of screen time by boys decreased significantly by 8.2%.

Conclusion The European Youth Tackling Obesity-Kids, SM and peer-led intervention, effectively increased physical activity hours/week in girls, but was not effective in improving the percentage of children who consumed the recommended fruit. Moreover, the percentages of girls who consumed sweets, soft drinks and fast food and boys screen time decreased.

Trial registration number NCT02702336; Pre-results.

  • health behaviour
  • health promotion
  • lifestyle
  • public health

This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.

https://doi.org/10.1136/jech-2017-210163

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    Footnotes

    • Contributors LT, ELL, MA-M, MG and RS made substantial contributions to the conception and design or the acquisition of data. All authors were involved in drafting the manuscript or revising it critically for important intellectual content and gave final approval of the version to be published. Each author has participated sufficiently in the work to take public responsibility for appropriate portions of the content and agreed to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.

    • Funding This research project was funded by Obra Social La Caixa, Convocatòria acció social 2015. Reference: AS15-00350//17.980 euros.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Patient consent Parental/ guardian consent obtained.

    • Ethics approval The EYTO-Kids project protocol was approved by the Ethics Committee of the University Hospital of Sant Joan de Reus (Ref: 16-01-28/1prog1).

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.