Consumer Attention to an Over-the-counter Warning in Four Different Styles of Design

The study consisted of three objectives: (a) to test the relative prominence and conspicuousness of a warning required by US law to be conspicuous; (b) to explore whether or not the conspicuousness of the said warning can be enhanced graphically; and (c) to develop preliminary data for power analysis that would guide decisions related to sample size in future studies. Seventeen subjects viewed four over-the-counter drug packages (each with a different style of warning) along with five other products while wearing an eye tracking device. Four styles of warning were used on the over-the-counter drug packages: no outline and no fill, outline and no fill, no outline and fill, and outline and fill. The surface area and the placement of the warnings were held constant across all four designs and were consistent with those on commercially available products. Collected data were broken into five zones: warning, brand name, strength, product benefit and net weight. Despite the fact that US law requires it to be conspicuous, the tested warning was significantly less noticeable than the brand name (objective one) for all dependent variables analyzed (α = 0.05). No significant difference was indicated for the varied warning designs (objective two). This could be because not much can be done to enhance prominence when constrained to the limited space that is typically used for such warnings or because of the limited sample size. Power calculations suggest that a sample size of nearly 200 subjects would be required to detect a 2.5 s mean difference at 80% confidence (objective three)

Quantifying Age-Related Differences in Information Processing Behaviors When Viewing Prescription Drug Labels

Adverse drug events (ADEs) are a significant problem in health care. While effective warnings have the potential to reduce the prevalence of ADEs, little is known about how patients access and use prescription labeling. We investigated the effectiveness of prescription warning labels (PWLs, small, colorful stickers applied at the pharmacy) in conveying warning information to two groups of patients (young adults and those 50+). We evaluated the early stages of information processing by tracking eye movements while participants interacted with prescription vials that had PWLs affixed to them. We later tested participants’ recognition memory for the PWLs. During viewing, participants often failed to attend to the PWLs; this effect was more pronounced for older than younger participants. Older participants also performed worse on the subsequent memory test. However, when memory performance was conditionalized on whether or not the participant had fixated the PWL, these age-related differences in memory were no longer significant, suggesting that the difference in memory performance between groups was attributable to differences in attention rather than differences in memory encoding or recall. This is important because older adults are recognized to be at greater risk for ADEs. These data provide a compelling case that understanding consumers’ attentive behavior is crucial to developing an effective labeling standard for prescription drugs

Actual vial used in this study depicting the three label zones of interest 1a

<p>- (1) cap, (2) standard white pharmacy label and (3) prescription warning label (PWL). (Inset: Five color contrasts of PWLs used in this study) 1b- Flattened, scaled drawing.</p

Estimated percentage of correctly recognized PWLs contingent on fixation.

<p>Estimated percentage of correctly recognized PWLs contingent on fixation.</p

Least Square Mean Estimates of the number of gaze shifts into a label zone by age and estimated standard errors (whiskers).

<p>Least Square Mean Estimates of the number of gaze shifts into a label zone by age and estimated standard errors (whiskers).</p

Serial steps of a commonly recognized information processing model.

<p>Serial steps of a commonly recognized information processing model.</p

Least Square Mean Estimates (across subjects) of percentage of the probability of fixation by zone and age group.

<p>Error bars represent the between subjects standard error.</p

Experimental set up (chin rest, calibrated plane and the head-mounted optics of our ASL 501 eye tracking unit).

<p>Experimental set up (chin rest, calibrated plane and the head-mounted optics of our ASL 501 eye tracking unit).</p

Estimated mean total eye-gaze time spent on the Nutrition Facts Panel for cereal and cracker packages that did and did not include an FOP label.

<p>A 2-way interaction was apparent between product type and whether an FOP label was present or not, P<0.05.)</p

Estimated number of visual hits on the Nutrition Facts Panel for cereal and cracker packages that did and did not include an FOP label.

<p>A 2-way interaction was apparent between product type and whether an FOP label was present or not. ^a,b P<0.05</p