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In this paper, Gina Neff and Blake M. DiCosola III revisit concepts of nudge in the context of helping consumers to make healthier food choices.

Abstract

In ‘Nudging Behavior Change: Using In-Group and Out-Group Social Comparisons to Encourage Healthier Choices’, Gina Neff and Blake M. DiCosola III revisit concepts of nudge in the context of helping consumers to make healthier food choices.

They introduce a novel form of social influence nudge not yet investigated by HCI scholars, the out-group social comparison, and test whether this form of nudging works at the point of checkout rather than the more conventional point of product consideration.

Across two online experiments, they measure the effectiveness of using nutritional information nudges with added in-group (people like you) and out-group (people not like you) social comparisons.

Their preliminary findings suggest that out-group social comparison nudges can be effective in encouraging both normal weight and overweight adults to reduce calories, even when these adults indicate that they do not typically change their diet behaviors.

This research has implications for digital information design, interactive marketing, and public health.

Authors

Blake M. DiCosola III

Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

Department of Informatics, University of California (Irvine), United States

Gina Neff

Minderoo Centre for Technology & Democracy, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom

Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

Journal Title

Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems – Proceedings

Identifiers

Rights

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