Marketing Fruit and Vegetable Intake with Interactive Games on the Internet

Abstract

National social marketing campaigns encourage Americans to eat at least five servings of fruits and vegetables each day to promote health and reduce chronic disease. Despite widespread promotion, consumption remains below recommended levels. The Internet and interactive games may prove to be novel campaign strategies. In this project, three interactive nutrition games were developed for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's Fruits and Veggies—More Matters website with the aims of increasing users' self-efficacy and intake of fruits and vegetables by teaching skills and providing practice in selecting healthy fruits and vegetables. The games were evaluated with two samples of adult Internet users who were recruited online in a pretest–posttest controlled design. Outcomes were assessed with self-report measures. Use of the games increased users' confidence that they could eat three or more servings of fruits and vegetables daily, but had no direct impact on actual dietary intake of these food items. Users found the games to be informative and satisfying. Further, those who were more satisfied with the games reported eating more servings of fruits and vegetables. Interactive games may stimulate use of social marketing websites and attract important hard-to-reach populations.