An Experimental Comparison of the Impact of 'Warning' and 'Health Star Rating' FoP Labels on Adolescents' Choice of Breakfast Cereals in New Zealand.

Robert Hamlin,Benjamin Hamlin

doi:10.3390/nu12061545

Abstract

This research investigated the performance of the red, octagonal Vienna Convention traffic ‘STOP’ sign as a front of pack (FoP) warning nutritional label. While the Vienna Convention traffic light system is an established FoP label, the potential of the ‘STOP’ sign in the role has not been investigated. The performance of the ‘STOP’ label was compared with that of a single star (low nutritional value) Australasian Health Star Rating (HSR) label using a fractionally replicated Latin square design. The labels were presented on choice diads of cold breakfast cereal packets. The sample of 240 adolescents aged 16–18 was drawn from a secondary school in the South Island of New Zealand. A large and significant main effect was observed at the p < 0.01 level for the difference between the ’STOP’ sign and the control condition (no nutritional FoP label), and at p < 0.05 for the difference between the HSR and the ‘STOP’ label. There was no significant difference between the HSR FoP and the control condition. A significant non-additivity (interaction) (p < 0.01) was also observed via the fractional replication. The results indicate that the Vienna Convention ‘STOP’ sign is worthy of further research with regard to its potential as an FoP nutritional label.

Highlights

When front of pack (FoP) labels first appeared, the intent of their backers was purely to inform food consumers, resulting in systems such as the recommended daily intake (RDI)
A large and significant main effect was observed at the p < 0.01 level for the difference between the ’STOP’ sign and the control condition, and at p < 0.05 for the difference between the Health Star Rating (HSR) and the ‘STOP’ label
The results indicate that the Vienna Convention ‘STOP’ sign is worthy of further research with regard to its potential as an FoP nutritional label

Summary

Introduction

When front of pack (FoP) labels first appeared, the intent of their backers was purely to inform food consumers, resulting in systems such as the recommended daily intake (RDI). Matters have advanced to the point that Jones (2019) based their analysis on 31 government endorsed systems, with a bewildering variety of formats that range from the purely informative to the fully evaluative [2] This complexity increases the diversity of regulatory, calibration and domestic/international legal issues that jurisdictions have to deal with [3]. The recent emergence of front of pack (FoP) nutritional ‘warning’ labels, most notably the system developed in Chile based upon a battery of black octagons, has generated considerable research interest [7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14] (Figure 1) This system has been the subject of several studies with regard to its performance relative to other established FoP systems over the last four years [15,16,17]. A classification cuesthat thatare are encountered encountered on products at the point of sale

Objectives

Methods

Results

Conclusion