Trial reportBMC public health2020
Promoting healthy foods in the new digital era on Instagram: an experimental study on the effect of a popular real versus fictitious fit influencer on brand attitude and purchase intentions.
Trial report in BMC public health, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 29 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
29 citing papers in PubMed, 118 citations in OpenAlex.
- Educators, Not Influencers: Health Content Creator Perspectives on Research Recruitment Collaboration.Health expectations : an international journal of public participation in health care and health policy · 2026Article
- How social and environmental contexts shape adolescent girls' eating behaviors in Southern Iran: a qualitative directed content analysis based on the social cognitive theory.BMC public health · 2026Article
- Shaping Food Consumption Among Generation Z in Mexico City: The Role of Digital Stimuli and Brand Engagement in Restaurant Decision-Making.Foods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Reversing the gap: Do gendered food preferences explain a historic shift in obesity from women to men?SSM - population health · 2026Article
- Examining the spread of nutrition-based misinformation by TikTok influencers: an experimental analysis of trust among young adults.Journal of health, population, and nutrition · 2026Article
- Who sends the message matters: social media messengers and adolescent eating.Frontiers in nutrition · 2026Article
- The burden of disease attributable to high body mass index across Arab countries: an analysis of data from the global burden of disease study 2021.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Beauty and the beast: an experimental study on the effect of Instagram food posts featuring a celebrity vs. without a celebrity on the eating intention of healthy vs. unhealthy food.BMC public health · 2025Article
- The Impact of Health Warnings in e-Cigarette Content on Instagram on Adults' e-Cigarette Cognitions: Online Between-Subjects Experiment Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Social media food marketing landscape of children living in Republic of Srpska, Bosnia and Herzegovina: Piloting the WHO CLICK framework, results and lessons learned.Journal of health, population, and nutrition · 2025Article
- Helpful or harmful? Navigating the impact of social media influencers' health advice: insights from health expert content creators.BMC public health · 2024Article
- Examination of the adoption intention of new energy vehicles from the perspective of functional attributes and media richness.Heliyon · 2024Article
- Advances in Understanding the Interplay between Dietary Practices, Body Composition, and Sports Performance in Athletes.Nutrients · 2024Review
- What else is new about social media influencers? Uncovering their relation and content strategies, and the downsides of being famous.Frontiers in psychology · 2024Article
- Predicting willingness to consume healthy brand foods using the theory of planned behavior: the role of nutritional literacy.Frontiers in nutrition · 2024Article
- A model of purchase intention of complementary and alternative medicines: the role of social media influencers' endorsements.BMC complementary medicine and therapies · 2023Article
- Virtual idol marketing: Benefits, risks, and an integrated framework of the emerging marketing field.Heliyon · 2023Article
- The food and beverage cues in digital marketing model: special considerations of social media, gaming, and livestreaming environments for food marketing and eating behavior research.Frontiers in nutrition · 2023Article
- Central Persons in Sustainable (Food) Consumption.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- An Instagram Hashtag Fostering Science Education of Vulnerable Groups during the Pandemic.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundMost studies on social influencer marketing techniques have focused on the promotion of unhealthy foods whereas little is known about the promotion of healthier foods. The present experimental study investigated whether a popular real versus fictitious fit influencer is more successful in promoting healthy food products. In addition, we examined the role of parasocial interaction as an underlying mechanism of healthy food product endorsement.
methodsWe used a randomized between-subject design with 154 participants (mean age: 24.0 years). Viewers' product attitude and purchase intention were tested after exposure to an Instagram post by a popular real fit influencer (n = 77) or fictitious fit influencer (n = 77).
resultsResults showed that parasocial interaction mediated the relation between the type of influencer and product attitude as well as purchase intention. Parasocial interaction was higher for participants exposed to the popular real fit influencer compared to the fictitious fit influencer, leading to higher healthy food brand attitude and purchase intention. DISCUSSION: The findings showed that it is crucial for social influencers to establish a warm personal relationship and connection with the their followers when promoting a healthy product successfully. We suggest that the promotion of healthy foods could be more successful in public health when using popular fit influencers.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.