Impact of Mixed Reality Food Labels on Product Selection

Abstract

The rise in diet-related non-communicable diseases suggests that consumers find it difficult to make healthy food-related purchases. This situation is most pertinent in fast-paced retail environments where customers are confronted with sugar-rich or savory food items. Countermeasures such as front-of-package labelling are not yet mandated in most regions, and barcode scanning mobile applications are impractical when purchasing groceries. We thus applied a mixed reality (MR) wearable headset-mediated intervention (N = 61) at vending machines to explore the potential of passively activated, pervasive MR food labels in affecting beverage purchasing choices. Through conduction of a betweensubject randomized controlled trial, we find significant, strong improvements in nutritional quality of the selected products (Energy:-34% KJ/100ml, Sugar:-28% g/100ml). Our post-hoc analysis suggests that the intervention effect is especially effective with existing food literacy. This study motivates further research on MR food labels due to the promising, observed intervention effects.

Virtual, augmented, and mixed reality as a versatile tool in food consumer behavior evaluation: Recent advances in aroma, taste, and texture incorporation

“…MR technology has interesting applications in product selection in retail environments. Fuchs et al (2019) suggested and used the MR headset-mediated food labels (Nutri score) to study the product (beverage and snacks) selection behavior of customers in a vending machine. This kind of approach helped the customers in selecting nutritious products of lesser sugar and energy content.…”