Self-knowledge as intervention on nutrition behaviour (FA6 module 2)

Within the Project “Consumer Insights”, and together with Sensory Science, this module aims to analyze how knowledge about own physical reactions on sensory effects combined with narratives of self-awareness on nutrition behavior influences the individual buying patterns and consumerism of nutrition. As we found out in the first funding period of enable (WP 2.9), many people of all age and gender, but especially young men, consume unhealthy food products in their everyday life although they communicate self- and social-expectant normative nutrition knowledge in questionnaires and interviews. For the nutrition market and health policy, no reliable conclusions about the real consumption therefore are possible. Moreover, our results indicate that in general taste, socioeconomic status and habits are mentioned to be most important for the individual nutrition. For this, we designed a unique research project which combines social and economic methods with consumer participation elements, gained in the field of technology design and measurements of brain activity when being confronted with certain nutrition (smell and taste). With biographical Interviews and an olfactory-gustatory stimulation, the participants of diverse gender and age groups will learn more about their own physical reactions and get therefore more individualized alternatives for consumption and eating behaviour. Thus, we gain personalized knowledge results which incidents in a lifetime are relevant for taste and thereby the individual nutrition behaviour.

Our Objectives

Therefore, the objectives of the present project are:

  1. to identify biographic life transitions which are relevant in their physical-emotional dimensions for the practices of nutrition
  2. to explore which (normative) knowledge about nutrition is acquired during lifetime, how it is validated and how it affects every day nutrition
  3. to develop a Self-Learning approach to investigate how this knowledge influences in combination with the physical data, gained during the project, the self-perception, self-statements and the attitude towards healthy nutrition
  4. to include these research findings into product development and strategies of health policy