Effect of price change and nutrition information interventions on college students' purchase of low-calories foods

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of environmental interventions designed to increase price incentives and nutrition information on the purchase of low-calories foods in convenient stores in college campus. Two colleges participated in the study, one was experimental group, and the other was control group. The experimental design included seven periods (14 weeks), which consisted of (a) baseline (b) nutrition information intervention (c) interim baseline (d) price decrease intervention (e) interim baseline (f) combination information and price intervention (g) final baseline. The target food items consisted of low-fat milk, low-fat yogurt, low-sugar tea, and low-sugar soybean milk. The control items were the products matched for type of food. During the price intervention periods, the prices of target items decreased by 20-30%. During the information intervention periods, the messages of calories which the food products contained were showed on the product labeling. The dependent variables were the sales of food items. MAVOVA will be used to analyze the effects of interventions on food sales. The results of this study will have implications for school health policies aimed to promote the consumption of healthy food among college students.