Resetting Nutritional Defaults: Testing the Effect of NuVal on Older Adults

描述(申请人提供)：本提案是对RFA-AG-10-008《通过情况的行为经济分析实现健康老龄化》(R01)的回应。这项建议呼吁行为经济学家和临床医生探索开发和测试默认选项，以促进更健康的行为。这个项目将考察不对称家长制在多大程度上能够激励老年人购买营养价值更高的食物。具体地说，我们将评估中西部最大的零售杂货连锁店之一Hy-VeeTM即将在爱荷华州东部部署的一项新的营养评分计划(NuValTM)对该地区老年人的一般购买行为的影响。此外，我们将通过营养评分来检查商品总销售量的变化，这些变化可以归因于干预，作为一种手段来验证和比较我们在老年人口中发现的行为变化，并将其与该地区的普通民众进行比较。从理论上讲，评分系统应该会帮助消费者克服一种现状偏见，即默认购买他们有经验的产品，或者他们错误地认为是健康的产品，并设定一个新的默认，即依赖NuValTM评分来指导购买。一种双管齐下的方法将捕捉NuValTM营养评分系统的效果：1)执行前瞻性数据收集，以检查一组50岁及以上的爱荷华州东部人在NuValTM干预前后的购物行为，他们是爱荷华州大学STAR注册中心的志愿者研究对象，以获得有关NuValTM干预对老年消费者食品购买行为影响的信息；2)通过使用对各种NuValTM评分的产品销量的中断时间序列分析，衡量NuValTM评分对整个当地人口购物行为的影响程度。 公共卫生相关性：美国人选择食物的方式与肥胖流行和其他相关的老年人慢性病密切相关。一种新的评分系统(NuVal)提供了一种方法，允许消费者通过一个数字来识别食物的营养质量。这种营养系统有可能提供重要的公共卫生信息，影响老年人的饮食方式。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This proposal is in response to RFA-AG-10-008, Healthy Aging through Behavioral Economic Analyses of Situations (R01). This proposal calls for exploration by behavioral economists and clinicians to develop and test default options to promote healthier behaviors. This project will examine the extent to which asymmetric paternalism can motivate older adults to purchase foods of higher nutritional value. Specifically, we will evaluate the effects of a new nutritional scoring program (NuValTM) that soon will be deployed in eastern Iowa by Hy-VeeTM, one of the largest retail grocery store chains in the Midwest, on the general purchase behaviors of a sample of area older adults. Additionally, we will examine changes in overall sales volume of items by nutritional score that could be attributed to the intervention as a means of validating and comparing the behavior changes we find in the older adult population to the general populace for this area. In theory the scoring system should help consumers overcome a status quo bias of defaulting to purchasing products with which they have experience, or which they mistakenly believe to be healthful, and set a new default, namely, relying on a NuValTM score to guide purchasing. A two-pronged approach will capture the NuValTM nutritional scoring system effect: 1) perform prospective data collection to examine pre and post- NuValTM intervention shopping behavior of a group of eastern Iowans age 50 and over, who are volunteer research subjects in the University of Iowa's STAR Registry, to obtain information on the NuValTM intervention's effect on food purchasing behavior of older consumers; 2) measure the extent to which the introduction of NuValTM scoring affects the shopping behavior of the entire local population through the use of interrupted time series analysis of sales volumes of a variety of products with varying NuValTM scores. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The way in which Americans select food is closely related to our obesity epidemic and other related chronic diseases in older adults. A novel scoring system (NuVal) provides a means of allowing consumers to identify the nutritional quality of a food with a single number. This nutritional system has the potential to provide important public health messages that affect the way older adults eat.