The Effect of an Application-based Health Intervention (FoodCoach) on Food Purchases in Switzerland

The FoodCoach study is a 9-week randomized controlled trial from the University of St.Gallen and the University Hospital of Bern, supported by the Swiss National Science Foundation #188402 and by Sanitas Management AG. Sanitas Management AG supports the recruiting of study participants without interfering with the study content. FoodCoach aims to investigate the effectiveness of improving people's food shopping healthiness by providing automated food shopping recommendations. The results of the study could possibly help improve the health status of the Swiss population and beyond in a low-cost and automated manner. The investigators collect participant grocery data via the loyalty card programs "Migros Cumulus" and "Coop Supercard" after obtaining participants' informed consent. From this data, the investigators generate automated recommendations that are based on the Nutri-Score framework and expertise of dieticians at the University Hospital of Bern. After sign-up, participants are randomized into a treatment and a control group. The treatment group receives automated recommendations via the FoodCoach Web Application, while the control group only receives a report about their food shopping by email after the intervention phase. Both groups need to finish the same onboarding survey where the investigators collect basic demographic information. After the intervention, the treatment group will receive a post-study survey containing two parts via email. Part 1 includes questions about the ease of use, interface and satisfaction and usefulness of the FoodCoach app. Part 2 includes questions about the participants' weight and height, the motivation to shop healthily and sustainably. The control group will receive a post-study survey which only contains part 2 as described before via email.