“Honey=Sugar ” Means Unhealthy: Investigating How People Apply Knowledge to Rate Food’s Healthiness

While previous research studied the high level attributes people consider when they assess the healthiness of food they are familiar with, little work has looked at how people assess arbitrary, potentially unfamiliar, food to decide whether it is a healthy choice. Since there is a growing body of work in Ubicomp around health practices, including systems to support healthy eating, it is important to understand how people apply the knowledge they have to food decisions. In our studies we identified 8 attributes participants use for determining if they think a food is “healthy ” or not. Based upon our analysis, we reflect on current system designs and propose four future design opportunities: capturing context of healthy eating, preparation and reflection on healthy eating understanding, sharing understanding and in situ information support. Author Keywords Health, behavior change, diet, healthiness of food