A Smart System to Empower Healthy Food Choices

适当的营养和健康的饮食是健康的一个关键方面，英国的强制性食品标签试图通过赋予人们信息来帮助他们做出更健康的选择来解决这个问题。这些信息的格式（例如，口头量词，如“低脂肪”或数字量词，如“5%脂肪”）会影响人们是否容易理解和使用食品标签。因此，研究人们对食品的判断和决定如何因食品标签格式的不同而不同，对卫生政策决策、消费者行为和食品工业实践产生了广泛的影响。这个项目将使用计算方法来确定人们用来决定什么食物是最健康的不同策略（例如，少脂肪，或少糖等）。我将评估哪些策略产生最健康的选择，使用这些见解来通知政策，并与我的行业合作伙伴进行知识交流。这个项目将巩固我的博士学位，研究人们在食品标签上使用口头和数字量词时决策策略的差异。通过混合使用行为任务、调查和眼球追踪方法，我发现呈现数量的不同方式会导致人们依赖不同的信息来判断食物。我打算从四个方面扩展这项研究并使其影响最大化。首先，我将把新的先进的统计模型应用到我的研究中。为了在我的数据中分类和预测食物选择策略，我将学习两种建模技术：多项处理树，一种基于概率的方法来分类选择，以及机器学习，它根据数据中的模式进行预测。例如，我希望这些模型能够识别食品标签上的线索，预测人们将做出的选择。使用这些分析的结果，我将提交一份计划的研究方案（“注册报告”），以在现实生活中的产品上测试我的模型。注册报告在数据收集之前会接受同行评审，因此在奖学金期间提交报告可以支持我在奖学金之外的未来学术研究。其次，我将通过与创业公司Keep Fit Eat Fit wellness Ltd （KFEF）的知识交流来扩大我的工作影响。作为整体健康套餐的一部分，KFEF为客户提供健康饮食建议和营养信息食谱。我的研究将告知他们的内容为客户的设计。反过来，与他们合作使我能够从他们的客户门户访问使用指标，我将分析这些指标，以确定通信格式是否有效。这些真实的数据将加强我博士的实验室研究，并帮助KFEF改进他们的产品。第三，将我的研究成果传播给学术界和非学术界的受众。对于学术观众，我将发表三篇新的期刊文章，并在一个本地和一个国际学术会议上展示我的工作。我还将通过准备新闻稿、向跨党派议会食品与健康论坛提交政策简报、参加威斯敏斯特食品与营养论坛会议等方式与非学术受众接触。通过这些渠道与决策者接触将有助于我游说对食品标签准则进行积极的改变。最后，我将准备一份向威康信托基金申请资金的提案，以创建和测试一个支持知情食物选择的技术系统。这个未来的提案将由我的博士数据、计算模型研究以及与以下方面的合作提供信息：行业（Keep Fit Eat Fit）、行为政策塑造专家（雷丁大学）和技术健康干预专家（康斯坦茨大学）。最终，我的研究旨在改善消费者选择食物的环境，使他们能够做出明智、健康的选择。

Proper nutrition and healthy diets are a key aspect of health, which mandatory food labelling in the UK tries to address by empowering people with the information to help them make healthier choices. The format of this information (e.g., verbal quantifiers like 'low fat' or numerical quantifiers like '5% fat') affects whether people can easily understand and use food labels. Examining how people's judgements and decisions with respect to food differ depending on food label format therefore has wide-reaching impact for health policy decisions, consumer behaviour, and food industry practice. This project will use computational methods to identify different strategies people use to decide what foods are healthiest (e.g., less fat, or less sugar, etc.) I will evaluate which strategies produce the healthiest choices, use these insights to inform policy and conduct knowledge exchange with my industry partner. The project will consolidate my PhD, which investigated differences in people's decision-making strategies when using verbal and numerical quantifiers on food labels. Using a mixture of behavioural tasks, surveys, and eye-tracking methodology, I identified that different ways of presenting quantities can lead to people relying on different pieces of information to judge food. I intend to extend this research and maximise its impact in four ways. First, I will apply new and advanced statistical modelling to my research. To classify and predict food choice strategies in my data, I will learn two modelling techniques: multinomial processing trees, a probability-based method to classify choices, and machine learning, which makes predictions based on patterns in data. For example, I would expect the models to identify cues on food labelling that predict the choices people will make. Using the results of these analyses, I will submit a planned research protocol (a 'Registered Report') to test my model on real-life products. Registered Reports receive peer review prior to data collection, so submitting it during the Fellowship supports my future academic research beyond the Fellowship. Second, I will extend the impact of my work through knowledge exchange with the start-up company Keep Fit Eat Fit Wellbeing Ltd (KFEF). As part of a holistic wellness package, KFEF produces healthy eating advice and recipes with nutritional information for their clients. My research will inform the design of their content for clients. In turn, working with them gives me access to usage metrics from their customer portal that I will analyse to determine if the communication formats are effective. These real-world data will reinforce the lab studies from my PhD and help KFEF improve their product offering. Third, I will disseminate my research findings to academic and non-academic audiences. For academic audiences, I will produce three new journal articles and present my work at one local and one international academic conference. I will also engage with non-academic audiences through preparing press releases, submitting a policy brief to present at the All-Party Parliamentary Food and Health Forum, and attending a Westminster Food and Nutrition Forum conference. Engaging with policy-makers through these channels will help me lobby for positive change to food labelling guidelines.Finally, I will prepare a proposal for funding from the Wellcome Trust to create and test a technological system that supports informed food choices. This future proposal will be informed by my PhD data, computational modelling research, and collaborations with: industry (Keep Fit Eat Fit), experts in shaping behavioural policy (at the University of Reading), and experts in technological health interventions (at the University of Konstanz). Ultimately, my research seeks to improve the food choice environment for consumers and empower them to make informed, healthy choices.