Use and understanding of nutrition information on food labels in six European countries

Abstract

AimThe goal of the study was to investigate the use of nutrition information on food labels and understanding of guideline daily amount (GDA) front-of-pack nutrition labels in six European countries.Subjects and methodsIn-store observations and in-store interviews were conducted in major retailers in the UK (n = 2019), Sweden (n = 1858), France (n = 2337), Germany (n = 1963), Poland (n = 1800) and Hungary (n = 1804), supplemented by questionnaires filled out at home and returned (overall response rate 50.3%). Use of labels was measured by combining in-store observations and in-store interviews on concrete purchases in six product categories. Understanding of GDA front-of-pack nutrition labels was measured by a variety of tasks dealing with conceptual understanding, substantial understanding and health inferences. Demographics, nutrition knowledge and interest in healthy eating were measured as potential determinants.ResultsAcross six product categories, 16.8% of shoppers were found to have looked for nutrition information on the label, with the nutrition grid (table or list), GDA labels and the ingredients list as the main sources consulted and calories, fat and sugar the information most often looked for. Understanding of GDA labels was high in the UK, Sweden and Germany, and more limited in the other countries. Regression analysis showed that, in addition to country-specific differences, use and understanding are also affected by differences in interest in healthy eating and in nutrition knowledge and by social grade.ConclusionUnderstanding of nutrition information seems to be more widespread than use, suggesting that lack of use is a question of not only understanding, but also motivation. Considerable national differences exist in both understanding and use, some of which may be attributed to different histories of the role of nutrition in the public debate.

The role of health-related, motivational and sociodemographic aspects in predicting food label use: a comprehensive study

“…Furthermore, even if there was no overreporting in our study, we cannot know whether people who use labels more often use these labels as a decision aid to buy the healthiest product. In other words, we do not know whether label use translates into a healthier diet (see the last part of Grunert et al's conceptual framework of food label use (13,14) ). As our results suggest that people who are generally interested in health and healthy eating use labels more often than others, we can speculate that they may use labels for choosing healthy foods.…”

“…Other studies also supported the importance of health-related aspects for label use (see references (1), (2) and (5) for reviews of this literature). For example, having a strong belief in a relationship between diet and cancer, interest in healthy eating and being confident that one is able to eat healthily were associated with whether participants used labels at all (11)(12)(13)(14) . Furthermore, Petrovici and Ritson (15) found that self-reported nutrition knowledge and health motivation were positively related to frequency of label use.…”

Consumer Perceptions of Front-of-package Labelling Systems and Healthiness of Foods

“…Standard attributes used in market research on product labelling were used in the survey. The surveys were conducted in English and French and took place August [16][17][18][19][20][21]2011. The results were weighted by age, region and gender according to Statistics Canada 2006 Census data.…”

Perception of front-of-pack labels according to social characteristics, nutritional knowledge and food purchasing habits

“…) varies considerably across population subgroups. Acceptability, understanding and ensuing use are lower among men, the elderly, persons having low socio-economic status and individuals with little nutritional knowledge (3,7,(12)(13)(14) . Other features, including price, brand name, claims and ingredient lists, compete with nutrition labels for the attention of the consumer during purchasing; perception of nutrition labels thus differs according to consumer attention to such features (3,12,(14)(15)(16) .…”

“…Previous studies compared acceptability and understanding of FOP label formats according to sociodemographic and economic factors, nutrition knowledge and interest in other characteristics of packaged foods (4)(5)(6)(7)12,14,17) . However, they did not take into account dimensions constituting acceptability so as to more accurately define profiles of label perception and elucidate their relationship with individual characteristics.…”