(PTFS01-05-26) Health in the Eyes of the Beholder: Consumer Attention to Front-of-Package Warning Labels in a Supermarket Eye-Tracking Study

Objectives: Front-of-package labels (FOPL), recommended by the WHO and increasingly implemented worldwide, aim to inform consumers at the point of purchase and identify foods high in sugar, sodium, and saturated fat. However, their effectiveness has been evaluated primarily using self-reported measures, with limited objective evidence from real-world purchasing environments. This study aimed to assess consumer visual attention to FOPL in a real-life supermarket using mobile eye-tracking and compare objective attention with self-reported attention and attitudes.

Methods: A real-life observational field study was conducted in a supermarket using mobile eye-tracking glasses. Sixty adult participants selected products from four food categories while their eye movements were recorded. Eye-tracking outcomes included whether participants fixated on the FOPL and fixation duration. Following the shopping task, participants completed a questionnaire assessing self-reported attention to labels, attitudes, and recall of label presence and type.

Results: The proportion of products displaying warning labels chosen by participants closely reflected their availability on the shelves across the studied categories. Among participants who selected a labeled product, 45-53% fixated on the label at least once. On average, participants spent 7.5% of their viewing time on the chosen product fixating on the red label, corresponding to 0.5 (±0.5) s. Participants significantly underreported seeing the label compared with eye-tracking data (p = 0.016). Many participants did not accurately report label exposure, with 16% false positives (reported seeing the label without fixation) and 32% misses (did not report seeing the label despite fixation). Among those correctly reporting seeing a label, 28% accurately recalled the specific label type.

Conclusions: Visual attention to FOPLs in a real-life supermarket was limited and brief, and self-reported exposure did not consistently align with eye-tracking measures. These findings suggest that reliance on self-reported measures alone may overestimate consumer attention to FOPLs in real-world purchasing environments and highlight the value of incorporating objective attention measures when evaluating nutrition labeling policies.

Funding Sources: The Israel National Institute for Health Policy Research