The Nutri-score came about after several large-scale studies by Touvier and colleagues showing associations between nutritional quality and adverse health outcomes, including cancer. This sparked widespread media debate, she says, leading to public perception that people “were being poisoned” by the food industry, she tells me, which in turn increased pressure on food companies to make changes.
In response some manufacturers decreased the proportion of sugar in their products and shifted from refined grains to whole-grain flours. Supermarkets also promoted healthier products, which increased sales of “Nutri-Score A” products and decreased sales of “E” (poor nutritional quality) products, says Touvier. Consequently, Nutri-Score labelling has been shown to change consumer behaviour too.
Changing behaviour
So, short of systemic change in the food environment, is there a way we can navigate it better to make healthier choices?
Research suggests that encouraging individuals to change their behaviour can change their eating habits. Research led by Samuel Dicken and Abi Fisher at University College London has recently shown that one-on-one support reduced how much UPFs the 45 study participants ate.
Individuals were given individualised one-on-one coaching, including information about where to buy healthier food and access to low-UPF meal plans. They were also given guidance on cooking from scratch.
“We know we need to improve the environment but also we need to give people skills and actions to improve their diets,” says Dicken. “It’s all well and good saying ‘cook a meal’ but if you don’t have a kitchen, if you don’t have pots and pans, if you don’t have a fridge to store it in, there’s no way you’re going to do it.”
At the end of the six-month study period, the participants reported a 25% reduction in ultra-processed food intake among participants, as well as weight loss, reduced BMI and improved wellbeing.
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While this was a pilot study without a control group, the team hope to explore this further on a larger trial. The response from participants to these interventions was overwhelmingly positive too, he says.
Of course, personalised behavioural interventions are time-consuming and expensive to implement and healthy food tends to be more expensive than unhealthier options.
And to enact true change, several interventions must take place, Sassi says, because any one solution will not work in isolation. “We really need all these actions together because the [food] environment is so complex.”
And when we do so, Sassi and Touvier note that more individuals will be empowered to identify and limit high UPF diets and improve their overall health in the process.
* Melissa Hogenboom is a senior health correspondent at the BBC and author of Breadwinners (2025) and The Motherhood Complex. She is melissa_hogenboom on Instagram.
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