Nutrition Literacy in Adolescence: What Young People Understand About Food Labels and What They Do With It
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22275729Keywords:
Nutrition literacy, Food labels, Adolescents, Health literacy, Food choiceAbstract
Reading a food label, understanding it and acting on it are three different things, and the literature measures them as though they
were one. In a survey of 1,983 Malaysian adolescents aged 13 to 16, 89.7 per cent reported reading food labels while literacy
scored only moderate across comprehension, skills and attitudes alike. A United States survey found 92.4 per cent aware of the
food guide pyramid but 29.3 per cent aware of the dietary guidelines, and fewer than 25 per cent using nutrition facts labels to
decide what to buy. Objective testing widens the gap further: among more than 500 students, nearly 90 per cent could not define
serving size and a third could not compare two labels. In a school survey, 64 per cent selected the better of two snack labels, but
63 per cent cited the attractiveness of the label among their reasons for choosing.
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