Dr Magdalena Muc

Professional biography

Research Associate in the School of Education, Childhood, Youth and Sport

C23 REF Impact Co-Chair

My research interests lie in food environment and policy, focusing mainly on unhealthy food marketing in various settings including digital media, TV and outdoors. I use quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods to research children's and other stakeholders' awareness of and attitudes towards food marketing, the extent and nature of children's exposure to such marketing, monitoring methods and tools, and other aspects of the topic. 

My research expertise has grown from a biological background (MSc, Biology; Jagiellonian University in Cracow, Poland). Building on my Doctoral studies which examined the role of common risk factors in the association between obesity and asthma (PhD, Biological Anthropology; University of Coimbra, Portugal), I joined the Department of Clinical Sciences of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine to study the obesity markers, metabolic syndrome, prediabetes, and malnutrition in Brazil and Nigeria.

In 2018 I brought this expertise to the Adwareness project, funded by the Wellcome Trust, and led by the University of Liverpool in collaboration with the Open University. I explored children’s and parental attitudes and awareness of unhealthy food marketing to children in digital media.

Since this time, I have been involved in several projects on the topic of unhealthy food marketing and other food policy aspects, for example, menu calorie labelling in the UK, with the University of Liverpool, and a systematic review and expert interview project on the topic of unhealthy food marketing, commissioned by the Public Health England.

I have been collaborating with the World Health Organisation (Office for Europe) on several projects related to food policy. In (2019) I was commissioned to work on projects evaluating two food policies implemented in Portugal: the sugar tax and regulatory reduction of salt content in bread. In 2023 I was commissioned to update the WHO protocols and tools to monitor unhealthy food marketing to children, including tools that aid the WHO CLICK Framework. Currently, I am a member of the WHO Technical Advisory Group on brand marketing.

I joined the Faculty of Wellbeing, Education, and Language Studies in 2021 to work on projects advocating food marketing that places children’s health centrally. 

Between 2022 and 2024 I was involved in CLICKBITE study, funded by Safefood, which used innovative methods and tools to explore the extent and nature of exposure of children and adolescents to the digital marketing of unhealthy foods on the island of Ireland, their attitudes and awareness of such marketing, interaction with it, among other objectives.

In 2022-2023 I also contributed my expertise to the Best-ReMaP European Union Joint Action, developing EU-wide monitoring protocols and exploring facilitators and challenges in implementing the monitoring program in the Member States. We piloted the WHO protocols and templates in 14 countries and co-created an EU framework on food marketing.

As a REF Impact co-chair, I support other researchers in achieving and evidencing the impact their work has beyond academia (specifically focused on education). 

Research interests

Currently, my research interests are in the marketing of unhealthy foods to children and include:

• monitoring reach and power of unhealthy food marketing reaching children through various media and settings (methods, challenges, and facilitators)
• the effect of such marketing on people’s behaviour and preferences
• people’s awareness of and attitudes toward unhealthy foods marketing
• food policy and nutrition
• socioeconomic and environmental risk factors of obesity

Impact and engagement

The Best-ReMaP joint action resulted in the development of a coordinated and comprehensive EU-WHO protocol to monitor unhealthy foods in various settings (TV, internet, and outdoors) that Member States are be able to implement. Piloting the implementation of these tools resulted in 25 studies across 14 countries (Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Estonia, Finland, France, Ireland, Portugal, Republika Srpska, Romania, Serbia and Slovenia). This was accompanied by training the public health representatives in using the monitoring protocols and exploring the challenges and facilitators of the monitoring program implementation in order to inform future EU policy and actions. The JA also resulted in an EU Framework for Action.

The CLICKBITE study team collaborated with the University of Galway as well as a board of international experts in the field to comprehensively explore the unhealthy food marketing ecosystem in the Island of Ireland and inform future policy. This study is likely to contribute to the field with a range of relevant novel publications.

I am recognised as an expert in the field and am on the WHO Technical Advisory Group on brand marketing, where together with other experts in the field we are preparing guidance on regulating and monitoring food brand marketing.

I am currently co-supervising one MSc student at the Federal University of Sergipe, Brazil, and two international PhD students in Denmark (The University of Southern Denmark) and Portugal (The Directorate-General of Health and University of Porto). In all three projects, we are monitoring children's exposure to unhealthy food marketing in digital media and piloting innovative machine-learning tools. These will generate powerful evidence to advocate for regulation of marketing in digital spaces.

External collaborations

I collaborate with a range of national and international partners, including the University of Liverpool, The University of Galway, the University College of Cork, The Directorate-General of Health in Portugal, 13 EU partner countries involved in the Best-ReMaP Joint action, the World Health Organisation (European office), OECD and Joint Research Centre (JRC, EU), Federal University of Sergipe, Brazil; Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil, University of Porto and more. 

I am also collaborating with a public health charity Health Equalities Group from Liverpool, supporting the implementation and monitoring of the School Pledge aimed at improving the food environment in educational settings in North West of the UK.