Research

Adherence

Altering the default order of food products in an online supermarket to display items in ascending order of saturated fat content significantly reduces the percentage of energy from saturated fat in the shopping basket.

If you are designing an online grocery platform, sort products within categories by their saturated fat content in ascending order (lowest SFA at the top). This environmental nudge significantly reduces the saturated fat content of the shopping basket compared to random ordering or offering explicit swaps. This works best when the sorting is not explicitly labeled to the user, relying on the 'default' effect.

GoodSupportsHIGH confidence
Compared with no intervention, altering the default order of products to show foods in ascending order of SFA (n = 261) reduced SFA by − 5.0% (95%CI: − 6.3 to − 3.6)
Dimitrios A. Koutoukidis et al. · International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity · 2019

Why this rating

Randomized controlled trial with a large sample size (n=1088) and pre-registered protocol, though conducted in a simulated environment.

Source

Prominent positioning and food swaps are effective interventions to reduce the saturated fat content of the shopping basket in an experimental online supermarket: a randomized controlled trial

Dimitrios A. Koutoukidis et al. · International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity · 2019

rct · n=1240Cited 67×
Read the paper

This is one finding among thousands. Every one is graded and traced to its source, so you can see what the evidence actually supports. Browse the research →