Public acceptability of nudges targeting parents and children to improve children's health outcomes: results from an online experiment

Abstract

There is great potential for nudges to make gains in child health through improvement of lifestyle behaviors. In this study, I use an online sample of adults to test the acceptability of two nudges (one to address teenage smoking and the other to address pediatric obesity) when targeting one of three populations: adults, parents or children. The study shows that a majority of adult respondents would accept the use of nudges aimed at parents and children. The findings show that nudging parents or children directly has the same acceptability as nudging adults. These results suggest that when the objective of a nudge is to improve children's health, it is acceptable to target parents or children themselves. These results open the door to testing the efficacy of nudges in pediatric public health.