Facebook campaigns did not increase childrens school meal participation

Parents of elementary-aged children in states with free school meals joined private Facebook groups to see if social media could help kids eat better. The study involved 832 families who received messages for six weeks. Some groups saw campaigns about school meals while others read about books. Researchers tracked how often children ate lunch and breakfast at school. They also watched how much parents noticed the messages and talked about them. The results showed parents in the meal groups noticed messages more and read them more than the control group. They also talked more with others about the topics. However, children did not eat more lunch or breakfast. The data showed no increase in lunch participation or breakfast participation. The campaign was safe with no reported side effects or dropouts. While the digital approach worked to get parents paying attention, it did not change what children ate at school. This suggests that simply sending messages to parents may not be enough to solve the problem of low meal participation.