A2+INTRODUCTION

A2 Introduction

People often opt for cheaper, faster and more convenient food choices. With limited time and a fast pace lifestyle, our prototype will facilitate an interactive, quick, and easy environment to help consumers make healthier choices. The design concept will include four principles: convenience, nutritional education, interactivity, and integration which will help challenge today’s current social problem where people are most likely to choose unhealthy options for its ease. Today Informational dissemination of nutritional health awareness is seen throughout schools and public health outlets. Consumers are also able to obtain nutritional information from Canada’s Food Guide, made available by Health Canada, is available for print and order online or by phone. The guide delivers information regarding portion sizes and details on the function of metabolizing calories. It also provides guidelines of what to look for when reading Nutrition Fact labels. Canada’s food guide and nutrimental index labels can also be found in restaurants like Wendy’s and McDonalds where consumers can read over in a sit-in environment or to take for personal reference. Labels on packaged items have became mandatory in Canada in 2005 to help promote consumer knowledge about eating healthy and to help with obesity; though restaurants are not bound by any federal regulations to provide nutrition information for menu items unless restaurants make specific health claims (Robert Wood Johnson Foundation). With the a interactive design solution available at food courts, this can close gaps between vendors who do not participate in healthy consumerism. The labels used on packaged items and fact sheets relay facts regarding the ingredients of the food or drink, and help provide transparency in the marketplace for the consumer. However regardless of the mandatory labelling, self reported obesity is still increasing ( Health Canada). According to Statistics Canada, there has been an inclining amount of self-reported obesity over the past six years among Canadians. This trend is apparent across all age groups. This is an important relation that identifies the labelling has not effectively steered consumers into a healthier consumption. The members of Health Canada believe that something further must be done to overcome this problem. This is where our design solution will incorporate a touch screen system that can facilitate consumers who are pressed for time but find our interactive smart menu beneficial to their food decisions. The objective is to encourage consumers to participate in their own food process by instilling a smart conscious environment that encourages them to eat healthier. (niya to expand here) At the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Web site, they attribute obesity to stem from "environments that promote increased food intake, non-healthful foods, and physical inactivity." Multiple factors, such as genes, metabolism, behaviour, environment, culture, and socioeconomic status, all play a part in determining the weight of individuals. With the lack of supporting environments, our design solution will therefore bring consumers in an active integration with their own food decisions. This goal is done by placing our interactive kiosks strategically, so it may become a supporting element to the food courts environment.

A research conducted by Robert Wood Johnson Foundation states menu labelling reduces consumers’ intentions to purchase items high in calories and fat, except it also clarifies other studies conducted have proposed that health claims made by restaurants lead consumers to underestimate the number of calories in entrees (June, 2009) We can see there is a continual gap with information and consistency with merchants. Our solution must consider why there is a gap and how consumers interact with existing nutritional information sheets and if nutritional information is effective at point of sale. Robert Wood Johnson Foundation research helps us again to identity these questions. Most consumers have reported they like to see nutrition information where they go to eat, however consumers may not understand what they are reading nor do they know how many calories they need to eat per day. The research further suggests not only do they not know how to understand the calorie information they may need nutrition education in conjunction with point-of-purchase nutrition information to help them make healthier food choices (June, 2009) A study with adolescents using different ways to display or provide nutritional information was conducted and a key factor found was once a consumer was able to use nutritional information. The study showed with the provision of nutritional menus resulted in 29 percent of adolescents modifying at least one of their food orders, and 46 percent of modifications resulted in lower-calorie orders (Robert Wood Johnson Foundation). This proves a current gap between information and how it is used needs to be bridged in order to help consumers make healthier choices. By bridging this gap it can overcome the obesity problem and promote education consumers. The interactive kiosk vision helps to bridge this gap by providing a new avenue where nutritional at point of sale is re-invented. The design concept will include continue to provide consumer convenience, give them nutritional education they need to make informed choices, interactivity to feel like they are proactively participating in their own food decisions, and integration of the necessary nutritional values and what each age group needs to help challenge today’s current social problems.