Effectiveness of education intervention to reduce sugar-sweetened beverages and 100% fruit juice in children and adolescents: a scoping review

ABSTRACT

Objective

To determine the impact of educational intervention in reducing the consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) and 100% fruit juice in children and adolescents.

Design

We conducted a comprehensive Ovid Medline and Scopus search. Articles had to be peer-reviewed, full-text and published in English. Studies had to be controlled intervention, published between 1 January 2010 to 7 February 2021, and in children and adolescents. Study quality was measured using the Quality Assessment Tool for Controlled Intervention Studies.

Results

Forty intervention articles were included in this review involving 25,069 children and adolescents. All studies employed a quantitative research method using the Randomized Controlled Trial designs. Twenty-eight out of forty interventions used psychosocial theories. Study quality ranged from ‘fair’ to ‘good.’ Results showed that education intervention effectively reduced SSBs, and reduced 100% fruit juice in children.

Expert opinion

Reducing the SSBs consumption in children should be initiated by conducting school-based programs consisting of interactive learning process, psychosocial theories and the involvement of parents or caregivers. Theories that focus on personal, behavior and environment factors improve the effectiveness of the intervention. More research is warranted to investigate the impacts of 100% fruit juice on obesity, dental caries and risk of co-morbidities in children.

KEYWORDS:

• Children
• adolescents
• sweetened beverages
• fruit juices
• intervention (education)

Article highlights

• In children, high consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) is associated with obesity, metabolic syndrome and dental caries.

• High consumption of 100% fruit juice may lead to adverse health effects, as it contains a similar amount of free sugars as in SSBs.

• Education intervention effectively decreases the consumption of SSBs among children and adolescents and reduces 100% fruit juice in children.

• It is essential to include psychosocial theory or conceptual framework in education intervention.

• Participation of parents and caregivers improves the effectiveness of the educational program in children and adolescents.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed here

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded by Central Sugar Refinery Sdn. Bhd., Malaysia [Research No. 6300256-14001].