Research using a smartphone app has found people buy healthier foods if they use food labels.
Research using a smartphone app has found people buy healthier foods if they use food labels.
In newly published research, “Do nutrition labels influence healthier foodchoices? Analysis of label viewing behaviour and subsequent food purchases in a labelling intervention trial,” foods purchased by shoppers after looking at the label were about 13 percent healthier than foods where labels were viewed but the food was not then purchased.
Lead author, Professor Cliona Ni Mhurchu, of the University of Auckland’s National Institute for Health Innovation, says; “There was a significant association between label use and the healthiness of products purchased. Nutrition label use may therefore lead to healthier food purchases.”
Called the Starlight study, the four-week randomised, controlled trial studied the effects of three different types of nutrition labels on consumer food purchases: Traffic Light Labels, Health Star Rating labels, or Nutrition Information Panels.
Smartphone technology allowed participants to scan barcodes of packaged foods with their phone cameras and receive randomly allocated labels on their phone screen, and to record their food purchases.
The study app provided objectively recorded data on label viewing behaviour and food purchases over a four-week period.
