Guiding healthier food choice: systematic comparison of four front-of-pack labelling systems and their effect on judgements of product healthiness

Different front-of-pack (FOP) labelling systems have been developed in Europe by industry and organisations concerned with health promotion. A study (n 2068) was performed to establish the extent to which inclusion of the most prevalent FOP systems--guideline daily amounts (GDA), traffic lights (TL), GDA+TL hybrid (HYB) and health logos (HL)--impact consumer perceptions of healthiness over and above the provision of a FOP basic label (BL) containing numerical nutritional information alone. The design included within- and between-subjects factors. The within-subjects factors were: food (pizzas, yogurts and biscuits), healthiness of the food (high health, medium health and low health) and the repeated measurements under BL and test FOP label conditions. The between-subjects factors were: the system (GDA, TL, GDA+TL hybrid, HL), portion size (typical portion size and a 50% reduction of a typical portion) and country (the UK, Germany, Poland and Turkey). Although the FOP systems tested did result in small improvements for objective understanding under some conditions, there was little difference between the provision of an FOP label containing basic numerical nutritional information alone or between the various systems. Thus, any structured and legible presentation of key nutrient and energy information on the FOP label is sufficient to enable consumers to detect a healthier alternative within a food category when provided with foods that have distinctly different levels of healthiness. Future research should focus on developing greater understanding of the psychological and contextual factors that impact motivation and the opportunity to use the various FOP systems in real-world shopping settings

Guiding healthier food choice: systematic comparison of four front-of-pack labelling systems and their effect on judgements of product healthiness

Different front-of-pack (FOP) labelling systems have been developed in Europe by industry and organisations concerned with health promotion. A study (n 2068) was performed to establish the extent to which inclusion of the most prevalent FOP systems--guideline daily amounts (GDA), traffic lights (TL), GDA+TL hybrid (HYB) and health logos (HL)--impact consumer perceptions of healthiness over and above the provision of a FOP basic label (BL) containing numerical nutritional information alone. The design included within- and between-subjects factors. The within-subjects factors were: food (pizzas, yogurts and biscuits), healthiness of the food (high health, medium health and low health) and the repeated measurements under BL and test FOP label conditions. The between-subjects factors were: the system (GDA, TL, GDA+TL hybrid, HL), portion size (typical portion size and a 50% reduction of a typical portion) and country (the UK, Germany, Poland and Turkey). Although the FOP systems tested did result in small improvements for objective understanding under some conditions, there was little difference between the provision of an FOP label containing basic numerical nutritional information alone or between the various systems. Thus, any structured and legible presentation of key nutrient and energy information on the FOP label is sufficient to enable consumers to detect a healthier alternative within a food category when provided with foods that have distinctly different levels of healthiness. Future research should focus on developing greater understanding of the psychological and contextual factors that impact motivation and the opportunity to use the various FOP systems in real-world shopping settings

Full of sound and fury, signifying something : the impact of autonomic arousal on EGM gambling

An experiment was conducted to observe the influence of autonomic arousal on subsequent gambling behavior. Thirty-seven male and 32 female regular Electronic Gaming Machine (EGM) players were recruited through newspaper advertisements. Participants were randomly assigned to either: (1) a control condition, or (2) an experimental condition that introduced a loud white-noise event (80 db) at fixed 120 s intervals throughout the 5-min EGM gambling session. Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) measurements showed that the manipulation was successful in elevating autonomic arousal. The results showed differences in behavioral response to the manipulation based on prior experience with gambling problems. Persons with many gambling problems had lower average bet-sizes in the white-noise condition compared to the control, while those with few or no problems had higher average bet-sizes. The results suggest that arousal may provide different signals to gamblers with few versus many problems. Gamblers with many problems may interpret their arousal as a sign that they will soon lose money, while gamblers with few or no problems may associate feelings of arousal exclusively with winning

Histopathological findings in brain tissue obtained during epilepsy surgery

Item does not contain fulltextBackground: Detailed neuropathological information on the structural brain lesions underlying seizures is valuable for understanding drug-resistant focal epilepsy. Methods: We report the diagnoses made on the basis of resected brain specimens from 9523 patients who underwent epilepsy surgery for drug-resistant seizures in 36 centers from 12 European countries over 25 years. Histopathological diagnoses were determined through examination of the specimens in local hospitals (41%) or at the German Neuropathology Reference Center for Epilepsy Surgery (59%). Results: The onset of seizures occurred before 18 years of age in 75.9% of patients overall, and 72.5% of the patients underwent surgery as adults. The mean duration of epilepsy before surgical resection was 20.1 years among adults and 5.3 years among children. The temporal lobe was involved in 71.9% of operations. There were 36 histopathological diagnoses in seven major disease categories. The most common categories were hippocampal sclerosis, found in 36.4% of the patients (88.7% of cases were in adults), tumors (mainly ganglioglioma) in 23.6%, and malformations of cortical development in 19.8% (focal cortical dysplasia was the most common type, 52.7% of cases of which were in children). No histopathological diagnosis could be established for 7.7% of the patients. Conclusions: In patients with drug-resistant focal epilepsy requiring surgery, hippocampal sclerosis was the most common histopathological diagnosis among adults, and focal cortical dysplasia was the most common diagnosis among children. Tumors were the second most common lesion in both groups. (Funded by the European Union and others.)9 p