Using Artificial Intelligence and Computer Vision to Detect and Monitor Unhealthy Child-Directed Food and Beverage Marketing

Objectives: Childhood obesity and diet-related diseases are urgent global public health challenges, driven in part by children’s continued exposure to persuasive marketing of unhealthy foods. Manual evaluation of child-targeted food marketing is resource-intensive. This study leverage AI to identify child-targeted food products, classify marketing elements on food packaging, and explores the practical application of AI within a specific food category to assess the potential impact of proposed Canadian marketing-to-children regulations.