Miss Eleanor Rees

Research project: Improving nutritional education status in order to influence people's choice of food and opinion of a healthy diet.

Abstract

To understand how human behaviour and motivation impacts food choice and whether such behaviour can be altered to promote healthier lifestyles and reduce the impact of an increasingly obese society on our health services.

With much research suggesting those individuals with high self-competency more likely to maintain a healthy behaviour change a strong rationale can be found to investigate participants process of motivation both prior and after receiving information and guidance on the best practices to maintain a healthy lifestyle. Furthermore, Very little is known about many population's current intake and their knowledge as to what they perceive as good for them to eat. It is also unknown how people's attitudes alongside their demographics affect their choice of food and what motivators are valued enough to influence a change to improve their health.  Concurrent to the unknown successful motivators, current government recommendations are made on a population scale with very little individual relevance resulting in many people confused as to what they really should be eating to remain healthy. It is therefore the aim of this study to assess what people are perceiving as a "healthy diet" given the current recommendation, where they value their health in regard to food intake and what influence can change motivation to improve autonomous behaviour of food choice.