I read recently that ‘food is the drug of choice’ for most people. Retailers are saying much the same thing, with bumper sales of lollies and chocolate. People are looking for feel-good experiences, especially after our Covid year of horror. Donuts suddenly became the celebratory treat to signify zero new infections, leaving those with a sweet tooth still craving as supplies were stripped off shelves!
It’s the same for promoting health messages. We’ve been bombarded with worrying news about our health for more than a year. First it was the bushfire smoke that threatened us if we ventured out, even for a walk. Then we were given dire warnings of the consequences of exposure to an unseen virus. All true and sound advice. So, did our health professionals, politicians and the media get the messaging right?
Do we respond to threats, or positive messages about the benefits of taking care of our health and wellbeing, especially by eating nutritious food? OK, so the news media love stories about the latest research on how this or that food causes cancer or some other dread disease; but the majority of health/nutrition/food stories that people care about most are ones about hope and how some new development will benefit us. Messages like ‘we’ll be stronger, we’ll perform better’ works best if we want people to act and change what they’re doing.
Now is the time to tailor messages to what’s good about food and how the nutrition benefits can help. Australia’s ground-breaking sports dietitians discovered this years ago, when they realised that elite athletes were more interested in peak performance, than disease risks, and tailored their messaging (and the diets they recommended) to achieve that goal.
Time more communicators got the message. Think positive and promote good news – it will be far better received, and acted on.