Modeling Gender Differences in Healthy Eating Determinants for Persuasive Intervention Design

Abstract

Abstract. The onset of many health conditions, such as obesity and type 2 diabetes, can be prevented or at least delayed by adequate changes in diet. Various determinants of healthy eating -such as Weight Concern, Nutrition Knowledge, Concern for Disease, Social Influence, and Food Choice Motivehave been manipulated by persuasive technologies to motivate healthy eating behavior. However, the relative importance and the dynamic of interaction between the determinants of healthy behavior for males and females are still unknown. Understanding how the determinants vary across user groups is important, as it will help persuasive technology designers personalize their interventions to the target demographics, thereby increasing the effectiveness of the intervention. To investigate for possible variations in healthy eating determinants, we developed separate models of healthy eating determinants for males and females. The models, which are based on a quantitative study of 228 (124 males and 104 females) participants, reveal some similarities and differences in the interactions between the determinants of healthy eating behavior. Based on the result from our models, we highlight some genderinclusive and gender-specific approaches to persuasive intervention design.

Committing to change: a persuasive systems design analysis of user commitments for a behaviour change support system

“…There were significant differences between genders in the paths from dialogue support to primary task support and dialogue support to social support (a stronger influence in females). This corresponds with the findings in Orji et al (2013) which found the determinants of healthy eating to vary across gender. Thus, pointing to the potential role gender, users' values, individual differences or the problem domain could have on the effects of the persuasive features and the importance of accommodating the needs of different user groups (Halttu & Oinas-Kukkonen, 2017;Schneider et al, 2016).…”

“…The study also conducted subgroup analysis to investigate how the perception of design principles vary between different groups. As understanding how the persuasive software features are perceived across user groups can help in personalizing behaviour change interventions thereby increasing their effectiveness (Orji, Vassileva, & Mandryk, 2013). Further analyses identified different relationships for the constructs' path coefficients and explained variances in the groups analysed compared to the full sample (Tables 8 and 9).…”

“…As noted in de Guinea and Markus (2009) Lastly, the sample also showed a bias toward male respondents, with 74% male. It is possible that male users possess goal-oriented characteristics, such as decisiveness, whereas female users place more emphasis on emotive qualities or hedonic value (Orji et al, 2013). To investigate the role of gender in the proposed model, we conducted a subgroup analysis of how the perception of the design principles varies between different groups.…”

Gender, Age and Subjective Well-Being: Towards Personalized Persuasive Health Interventions

“…Overall, 52% of the 732 participants are males and 48% are females. With regards to age, 21% (16)(17)(18)(19)(20)(21)(22)(23)(24), 19% (25-34), 17% (35)(36)(37)(38)(39)(40)(41)(42)(43)(44), 13% (45-54), 13% (55-64), 11% (65-74), and 6% (75+). Since our study aims at investigating whether there are differences between the gender groups (males and females) and age groups (younger adults and older adults) in their association with the distinct SWB components, it is therefore important to state that for the age group analysis, we selected and considered participants belonging to two age groups that are clearly different which is the standard practice.…”

“…The idea of personalizing health interventions is being advocated for by Persuasive Technology (PT) researchers [15][16][17][18]. This is because individual differences have been shown to play an important role in peoples' SWB.…”