The Impact of the Australasian 'Health Star Rating', Front-of-Pack Nutritional Label, on Consumer Choice: A Longitudinal Study.

Robert Hamlin,Lisa McNeill

doi:10.3390/nu10070906

Abstract

Front-of-pack (FoP) nutrition labels are a widely deployed tool in public good marketing. This article reports on a field experimental test of the impact of one of these systems, the Australasian Health Star Rating system (HSR), on consumer choice in the breakfast cereals category in New Zealand. This study forms part of a time-series replication stream of research on this topic. The research applied a 2 × 2 factorial design with multiple replications to retail food consumers exiting from supermarkets in New Zealand. The first part of the time series, undertaken shortly after the HSR’s initiation in 2014, indicated that the HSR was ineffective. Between 2014 and 2016, commercial brands in the category within New Zealand massively promoted the HSR as a basis for consumer choice. The research presented in this article forms part of the second part of the series, undertaken in 2016, using an identical experimental methodology to the 2014 study. The results indicate that the HSR may be beginning to influence consumer choice as it was predicted to, but the impact of the system is still small, and statistically sub-significant, relative to other consumer decision inputs presented on the package.

Highlights

It is generally accepted that over-consumption of certain nutrients, notably fat, sugar and salt, leads to increased morbidity and death [1]
The results of the research in Dunedin and Christchurch were treated as separate exercises because urban communities in New Zealand are quite isolated from one another and each as a result has its own culture
The results of the 2014 research exercise indicated that the consumer sample attended to and processed the Health Star Rating system (HSR), but that they did so in a manner that was consistent with any other nominal, commercial brand

Summary

Introduction

It is generally accepted that over-consumption of certain nutrients, notably fat, sugar and salt, leads to increased morbidity and death [1] These ingredients are both cheap to produce and highly palatable, which has caused consumption of these nutrients and related undesirable health outcomes to increase, rather than decrease, in both developed and developing economies in recent decades [2]. Sugar has come under scrutiny with regard to the targeting of children with highly processed, value-added food products [8,9] These matters attract researcher attention because the effects of this over-consumption lead to highly undesirable outcomes for the individual, and lead to increased costs at the collective community level, especially for those states that deliver extensive state funded health interventions [10,11,12].

Methods

Results

Conclusion