Read-B4-U-Eat : A Multicomponent Communication Module to Promote Food Label Reading Skills Among Adolescents in India

Effect of Educational Interventions on Understanding and Use of Nutrition Labels: A Systematic Review

“…Ages of participants ranged from the third grade (8 years) [ 26 ] up to 75 years old [ 24 , 27 ]. Participants included university students [ 28 , 29 ], school children or adolescents [ 26 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 ], disadvantaged or vulnerable adults [ 34 , 35 ] on existing education programs [ 36 ], or low-income adults [ 37 ], some with low health literacy [ 38 ]. Four studies were specifically conducted with adults with diabetes [ 25 , 27 , 35 , 39 ].…”

“…Almost half of the interventions ( n = 7) focused on nutrition label education entirely in a one-off session (Intervention Type 1) [ 23 , 24 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 33 , 38 ]. The shortest intervention was a ten-minute booklet viewing session [ 28 ].…”

“…The 11 studies which evaluated participants’ understanding or “knowledge” of nutrition labels reported statistically significant pre-post intervention increases in this outcome in their cohorts [ 24 , 29 , 30 , 33 , 36 , 39 ] or relative to the comparison group [ 25 , 26 , 27 , 31 , 38 ] ( Table 1 ). Considerable variation existed in questions used to evaluate understanding of nutrition labels at pre and posttest.…”

“…Other studies used only a few questionnaire items on nutrition labels which were included among those concerning other food label information involving ingredients, quality logos, cooking instructions etc. [ 23 , 24 , 31 , 34 , 36 ]. In one case, change in “knowledge of the nutrition label” was assessed using a single question asking if nutrition information was “present” on a food label [ 31 ].…”

“…There were 13 studies which evaluated impact of their interventions on nutrition label “use”, with all showing significant improvements in one or more measures of this outcome ( Table 1 ). Use of nutrition labels was evaluated using mainly self-reported pre-post questionnaire items [ 31 , 32 , 35 , 36 , 37 ] (i.e., “ How often do you read nutrition labels?” ). Objective use was evaluated in one study which found a significant increase in eye gaze time (by 1.3 s) in those viewing nutrition labels compared to the control group following a brief leaflet-viewing intervention [ 28 ].…”