A picture tells a thousand words: Impact of an educational nutrition booklet on nutrition label gazing

Overweight and obesity are major health issues in many countries. Nutritional labels provide a means to making healthier food choices. Gazing longer at nutrition labels rather than the products' packaging may be a first step in making a healthy decision when purchasing or consuming a product. Using eye-tracker methodology, we examined the influence of an educational nutrition booklet on duration of gaze at nutrition labels. Thirty-two adults from New York City participated in a pretest–posttest study. Participants were randomly assigned to the nutrition education group (NE) or the control group for 10 min. The NE group reviewed a picture-based educational nutrition booklet. The control group worked on a word find puzzle. Participants' duration of gazing at nutrition labels was assessed. Results revealed a significant interaction of group and nutrition label gazing such that the NE group gazed significantly longer at the nutritional label in the posttest compared to the pretest. The NE group gazed significantly longer at nutrition labels during the posttest than the control group. There was no effect for the control group. The findings show that briefly reviewing an educational nutrition booklet increases duration of gaze at nutrition labels.