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Changing people’s behavior can often feel nearly impossible. Especially when it comes to something with indirect benefits, like helping people far away or reducing environmental impacts.
But new research published in JAMA Network Open suggests that a small bit of information about a meal’s environmental impact could be enough to nudge people toward lower-carbon choices – and, in some cases, slightly healthier ones, too.
Researchers recruited more than 10,000 US adults for an online randomized clinical trial and asked them to order from a simulated fast-food menu. They used quota sampling to create a group broadly representative of the US population by gender, race, ethnicity, age, and education.
The 16-item menu was modeled on a popular US fast-food chain and included beef burgers, chicken, fish, salads, and a plant-based burger.
The researchers created six different label types alongside the menu items. Then they randomly assigned participants to see one of the labels.
One group just saw a QR code – this was the control. The other five groups saw different kinds of climate information on the labels.
One label showed an environmental “cost” for the menu item expressed in dollars, another showed a climate grade, a third showed a climate grade accompanied by a scale showing all possible grades, a fourth was simply a “high climate impact” label on high-greenhouse-gas-emission menu items (and no label on other foods), and a fifth had a “warning high climate impact” label.
The idea was simple: if people knew which foods had the biggest climate footprints, would they choose differently?
They did.
In the control group, which only saw the QR code (which didn’t show any climate information), 53 percent of participants selected an item the researchers classified as having a high climate impact. So that’s the baseline for what people chose without climate information on the menu.
That number dropped to 48 percent among people who saw a climate grade, 46 percent for those who saw a climate grade plus a scale, 45 percent for those who saw a high-climate-impact label, and 47 percent for those who saw a warning label.
The environmental cost group came in at 49 percent, but this was not significantly different from the control group.
So, while these changes were fairly modest, two labels performed better. The climate grade plus scale and the simple “high climate impact” label both showed the strongest effects on people’s choices (although the numbers were so close that the differences were minor).
The researchers didn’t just look at environmental harm – they also wanted to know if people were choosing less-healthy foods when making a more eco-friendly choice. That didn’t appear to be the case.
Overall, the groups didn’t differ significantly in Nutrient Profile Index scores, a measure that includes calories, saturated fat, sodium, sugar, fruits, vegetables, nuts, and fiber.
This study is an example of how presenting this kind of information can gently nudge people’s choices, at least in an online experiment. And it may matter how that info is presented, though because these differences were so small, it would definitely be worth further tests.
Even though these labels were all roughly showing the same thing, their outcomes varied a bit.
The environmental cost label translated emissions into a dollar amount but didn’t necessarily tell people whether that number was good or bad (and it was in a smaller black-and-white font), so it may have been easy to ignore.
The most effective labels were the easiest to read and understand. The researchers note that previous nutrition-label research suggests additional context can aid interpretation. Grade scales have also been used in other food-labeling schemes.
frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share” referrerpolicy=”strict-origin-when-cross-origin” allowfullscreen>The researchers also found that the climate grade and high-climate-impact labels were more effective at reducing high-impact selections among people who already expressed more concern about climate change (something they asked all participants about before the test).
The effects did not vary by age, gender, or political affiliation.
There is an important catch to this kind of study – nobody was actually standing in a fast-food restaurant, hungry and deciding what to eat (nor were there real monetary costs to consider).
The study was conducted online, participants selected just one entrée, and the emissions associated with menu items were estimates. The menu was also based on a single fast-food chain and offered a relatively limited range of foods.
So a climate label that changes someone’s choice on a screen may not have exactly the same effect in the real world.
Still, the researchers say the relatively small reductions seen in individual choices could add up.
“This randomized clinical trial’s findings suggest that using climate labels on restaurant menus, particularly climate grade plus scale designs, may decrease climate impact and improve nutrition of restaurant orders,” the study authors conclude.
About a third of US adults eat fast food on a given day, according to recent national data, so even these small labeling-driven changes could mean millions of higher-impact meals avoided each day.
Related: The World’s Vegetables Are Vanishing, And It’s Quietly Wrecking Our Diets
After all, most of us aren’t going to calculate the carbon footprint of our lunch before ordering it, or even know how to do that if we wanted to.
But if someone else does the math – and provides simple guidance – we might just make a different choice.
The research has been published in JAMA Network Open.
This article was fact-checked by Rebecca Dyer and edited by Rebecca Dyer. While we pride ourselves on our process, we are only human. If you spot a mistake, please let us know.