Effect of Gamification in an Online Grocery Store.

Not Applicable

Completed

Brief Summary: The overall objective of this research is to evaluate the impact of gamification on the diet quality of food choices made by American adults in an online grocery shopping experiment. Participants will shop for 12 food items from a grocery shopping list determined by the research team in a simulated online grocery store designed for this experiment. Each product has a nutritional quality score based on the Guiding Stars algorithm. The experiment tests the gamification of the nutritional quality score. Participants exposed to gamification see one to five crowns illustrating the nutritional quality of the food and a scoreboard indicating the total number of crowns from foods in the participant's shopping basket. Participants will be assigned to experimental conditions of gamification (game or no game) and a fictitious budget ($30 or $50). The investigators will test if the game and the budget affect the dietary quality of their final shopping baskets. The experiment is a 2x2 experimental design. The investigators hypothesize that the presence of gamification will change the dietary quality of participants' final shopping baskets. The investigators hypothesize that a higher budget will change the dietary quality of the final shopping basket. The investigators also hypothesize that the game and higher budget together will change the dietary quality of the final shopping basket.

Detailed Description: Participants will be assigned to one of four experimental conditions:

1. Game=No and Budget = $30

2. Game=No and Budget = $50

3. Game=Yes and Budget = $30

4. Game=Yes and Budget = $50.

Variables:

1. Game: Indicates exposure to the game (dummy variable)

2. Budget: Indicates exposure low ($30) or high ($50) budget constraint (dummy variable).

3. Total number of crowns: sum of the number of crowns associated with the 12 items included in participants' final shopping baskets (a continuous variable that ranges from 12 to 60).

4. Number of crowns: number of crowns associated with each of the 12 items included in participants' final shopping baskets separately (a continuous variable that ranges from 1 to 5).

Recruitment & Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria

Not provided

Exclusion Criteria

Not provided

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
High budget; no game	Simulated grocery shopping exercise	Participants will be asked to shop for 12 list items in the simulated grocery store without game elements (crowns and scoreboards) displayed. They will be given a high budget of $50.
High budget; game	Simulated grocery shopping exercise	Participants will be asked to shop for 12 list items in the simulated grocery store with game elements (crowns and scoreboards) displayed. They will be given a high budget of $50.
Low budget; no game	Simulated grocery shopping exercise	Participants will be asked to shop for 12 list items in the simulated grocery store without game elements (crowns and scoreboards) displayed. They will be given a low budget of $30.
Low budget; game	Simulated grocery shopping exercise	Participants will be asked to shop for 12 list items in the simulated grocery store with game elements (crowns and scoreboards) displayed. They will be given a low budget of $30.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Total number of crowns	One hour	Sum of number of crowns of foods included in the final shopping basket for each participant

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Number of crowns	One hour	Number of crowns for foods included in final shopping basket for each list item separately

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