No abstract

Most consumers are unaware of the high levels of calories, fat, saturated fat, and sodium found in many menu items. Provision of nutrition information on restaurant menus could potentially have a positive impact on public health by reducing the consumption of less-healthful foods.

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This research examines potential explanations of why consumers have difficulty making personal financial decisions that will be most beneficial in the long run. Within the decision context of retirement savings, results from an experiment suggest that self-regulatory state, future orientation, and financial knowledge can influence consumer evaluations and intentions related to retirement investments (i.e., a 401(k) plan). Findings suggest that consumers who express higher levels of future orientation are more likely to participate in a retirement plan, an effect moderated by self-regulatory state. Results also suggest that financial knowledge and orientation toward the future can interact to influence the likelihood of 401(k) plan participation. Among consumers with a basic level of financial knowledge, future-oriented consumers expressed a greater likelihood to participate in a retirement plan than less future-oriented consumers. However, in the absence of knowledge, consumers' orientation toward the future did not influence the likelihood of 401(k) plan participation.

Consumers of packaged goods products in the UnitedKeywords: nu t rition labe li ng, fron t*of-pac kage symbo ls, nu t rition consc iousness, U. S. Food and Drug Ad mi nistrati on C onsumers of packaged food products in the United States now face a dizzy ing array of fro nt -of-package (FOP) nutrition sy mbols and icons, including Kraft's "Sensible Solution," PepsiCo's "Smart Spot," Unilever's "Eat Smart" logo, the Ameri can Heart Assoc iati on's "Heart Chec k," General Mills' "Goodness Comer," the "Guiding Stars" from Hannaford Bros ., Ke llogg's use of the Guide· line Dail y Amo unt s, and , until recentl y, the Keystone Gro up and Nutrition Roundtable's "Smart Choices" icon To combat confusion created by the many sy mbols in the U.S. market, the Smart Choices (SC) icon was deve loped by the Keystone Gro up (a large industry, government , and academic coali tion), and it appea red on pac kages from icon (i.e., Smart Choices [SCI) , a more complex icon (i.e., Traffic Light-Guidelines Daily Amounts [TL-GDAsD, and a no-FOP icon control for the ir effects on nutrition eva luations, nutrient use accuracy, product altitudes, and purchase intentions. In addition, using prior nutrition labe ling research (Burton, Biswas, and Netemeyer 1994; Howlett , Burton, and Kozup 2008;Keller et al. 1997;Kemp et al. 2007), we examine consumers' "nutrition consciousness" as a potential moderator of effects of FOP nutrition icons re lative to Nutrition Facts Pane l infonnation. These study objectives focus on the recent FDA call for research (Federal Register 20 10 , p. 22605) in determining exactly how consumers will evaluate FOP summary icons versus nutrient-specific symbol s.

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The World Health Organization recently adopted the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, a groundbreaking public health treaty that will require that warning information in the form of text, pictures, or a combination of these two forms cover at least 30% of the front and back of cigarette packages. In three studies using smokers from the United States and Canada, the authors examine the effects of specific graphic visuals in the context of current U.S. verbal warnings. The findings indicate that including both graphic visual warnings, such as those used in Canada, and warning statements currently used in the United States can decrease the perceived attractiveness of the package and create higher levels of negative affect, such as fear or anxiety. The results also show that the addition of the specific visual warnings examined to the U.S. statements increases smokers' perceived intentions of quitting smoking compared with warning statements alone. The authors offer implications for public policy and public health and provide suggestions for further research.

This research examines whether temporal orientation moderates the impact of compulsive buying tendencies (CBT) on credit card debt. Participants completed the consideration of future consequences scale, a compulsive buying scale, and reported their credit card debt. Results revealed that CBT mediated the relationship between concern with immediate consequences and credit card debt, and high concern with immediate consequences magnified the impact of CBT on credit card debt. This suggests that compulsive buyers who focus on maximizing immediate consequences are at a much higher risk of building up significant amounts of credit card debt.