Attitudes, objective understanding, and food choices associated with front-of-pack nutrition labels across 12 countries

Participants will complete an online survey (hosted by an ISO accredited web panel provider) taking approximately 15 – 20 minutes. They will first be asked a series of socio-demographic questions before making decisions about fictional food products. Specifically, they will see 3 versions (1 healthy, 1 moderately healthy and 1 unhealthy) of 3 foods (breakfast cereals, cakes and pizzas) and will engage in a choice task followed by a ranking task for each set of 3 food products. In the choice task, respondents will choose from each set which product they would prefer to buy. An “I wouldn’t buy any of these products” option will also be available. Following the choice task, respondents will be asked to rank the 3 products from most to least healthy. An “I don’t know” option will also be included. Respondents will then be randomly assigned to one of the five front-of-pack label (FoPL) conditions; Health Star Rating system (HSR), Multiple Traffic Light (MTL) system, Nutri-Score, Reference Intakes (RIs) label, and Warning symbols. The same three sets of products shown in the control condition will be presented but this time with the randomly allocated FoPL present on the mock packages. Respondents will complete the same choice and ranking tasks from the control condition. Order effects will be controlled for by randomizing the presentation order of the products. Finally, respondents will be asked their perceptions of the FoPL they saw. A picture of the label will be shown and they will be asked whether they remember seeing the label on the food products shown in the survey. This will be followed by a series of questions asking about attitudes to the FOP label assessing liking (e.g. “I like this label”), usefulness (e.g. “This FoP label is useful”), awareness (e.g. “This FoP label stands out”), and perceived cognitive workload (e.g. “This label is easy to understand”). Each question will be rated on a 9-point Likert scale ranging from “Strongly disagree” to “Strongly agree”.