The aim of this thesis was to overview and describe the current state of marketing and representation of food and dietary supplements by influencers on the social media platform Instagram. For the purpose of this study Instagram was considered as a form of media. The study was conducted by following Slovenian influencers' posts, which included foods and dietary supplements in any form on Instagram for three months and capturing them with screenshots. Chosen influencers were not experts in the field of nutrition. From the collected data, we conducted an overview of the marketing methods of foods, checked the compliance of the nutritional and health claims with legislation, and profiled the advertised foods using the Nutri-Score tool. We overviewed 443 posts that were shared by 26 different infuencers. In the captured posts, influencers most commonly portrayed composed meals (24 %), dietary supplements (16 %), sweet snacks (14 %), alcoholic beverages (14 %) and non-alcoholic beverages (5 %). None of the health claims used in the posts were in compliance with legislation, while only two out of 12 (16%) total of the nutritional claims were appropriate. We found that cureently the foods that were marketed and promoted of the social media plaftorm Instagram were predominantly categorized as nutritionally less favorable. That could contribute to the development of unhealthy dietary habits of the population. In 42% of the posts, influencers shared content about diet, which, based on the selected criteria, could have a negative impact on the dietary choices of consumers who follow them. We found that the promotion of foods through social media networks is poorly regulated and supervised from a legislative standpoint. In this area a legislative framework adapted to the rapid development of social networks and new communication tools would be necessary to more precisely prescribe allowed and not allowed forms of food promotion and thereby support public health.
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