Nutri-Score Label Influence on Food Purchase Intention Depends on Consumers' Expectations of Healthiness.

Abstract

Front-of-Package (FOP) nutrition labels are designed to convey the healthiness of food products and help consumers make healthier choices. This research examines how French consumers' responses to a FOP nutrition label-Nutri-Score-are influenced by their initial expectations regarding the overall healthiness of products. Based on expectancy-disconfirmation theory, we hypothesize that when consumers expect products to have a better score than the one displayed on the FOP label, the label will enhance guilt perception and reduce purchase intention. Conversely, when consumers expect a worse score than the one displayed, the label will diminish guilt perception and increase purchase intention, for healthy and unhealthy products. A pilot study, two controlled lab experiments, and one field study test our proposition. Participants were randomly assigned to the label conditions (Nutri-Score vs. control), while prior expectations of healthiness were a non-randomized factor. Study 1 (N=128) validates our proposition with judgments of an unhealthy food item (Nutri-Score-D). Study 2 (N=147) extends these findings to both healthy and unhealthy food products. When the Nutri-Score grade was better-than-expected, it reduced guilt and boosted purchase intention, even for low nutritional quality foods (Nutri-Score-D). Conversely, a worse-than-expected Nutri-Score increased guilt and lowered purchase intention, even for healthier products (Nutri-Score-B). A field study (1,680 sales) suggests that including the Nutri-Score label to products sold in a cafeteria can increase the sales of products labeled D. We show that a nutrition label may, in some cases, increase purchase intentions of unhealthy products and decrease purchase intentions of healthy ones.