Sugar tax and product reformulation proposals reduce the perceived legitimacy of health-promotion institutions : a randomized population-based survey experiment
© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Public Health Association..
BACKGROUND: Structural nutrition interventions like a sugar tax or a product reformulation are strongly supported among the public health community but may cause a considerable backlash (e.g. inspiring aversion to institutions initiating the interventions among citizens). Such a backlash potentially undermines future health-promotion strategies. This study aims to uncover whether such backlash exists.
METHODS: We fielded a pre-registered randomized, population-based survey experiment among adults from the Longitudinal Internet Studies for the Social Sciences panel (n = 1765; based on a random sampling of the Dutch population register). Participants were randomly allocated to the control condition (brief facts about health-information provision/nudging), or one of two experimental groups (the same facts, expanded with either a proposed sugar tax on or reformulation of sugar-sweetened beverages). Ordinary least squares regression was used to estimate the proposed interventions' effects on four outcome variables: trust in health-promotion institutions involved; perceptions that these institutions have citizens' well-being in mind (i.e. benevolence); perceptions that these institutions' perspectives are similar to those of citizens (i.e. alignment of perspectives); and attitudes toward nutrition information.
RESULTS: Trust, perceived benevolence and perceived alignment of perspectives were affected negatively by a proposed sugar tax (-0.24, 95% CI -0.38 to -0.10; -0.15, -0.29 to -0.01; -0.15, -0.30 to 0.00) or product reformulation (-0.32, -0.46 to -0.18; -0.24, -0.37 to -0.11; -0.18, 0.33 to -0.03), particularly among the non-tertiary educated respondents.
CONCLUSIONS: Sugar taxes or product reformulations may delegitimize health-promotion institutions, potentially causing public distancing from or opposition to these bodies. This may be exploited by political and commercial parties to undermine official institutions.
TRIAL REGISTRATION: https://osf.io/qr9jy/?view_only=5e2e875a1fc348f3b28115b7a3fdfd90. Registered 3 February 2022.
| Medienart: |
E-Artikel |
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| Erscheinungsjahr: |
2024 |
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| Erschienen: |
2024 |
| Enthalten in: |
Zur Gesamtaufnahme - year:2024 |
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| Enthalten in: |
European journal of public health - (2024) vom: 01. Feb. |
| Sprache: |
Englisch |
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| Beteiligte Personen: |
van Meurs, Tim [VerfasserIn] |
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Date Revised 02.02.2024 published: Print-Electronic Citation Status Publisher |
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| doi: |
10.1093/eurpub/ckae013 |
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| funding: |
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| Förderinstitution / Projekttitel: |
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| PPN (Katalog-ID): |
NLM367947811 |
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| 500 | |a published: Print-Electronic | ||
| 500 | |a Citation Status Publisher | ||
| 520 | |a © The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Public Health Association. | ||
| 520 | |a BACKGROUND: Structural nutrition interventions like a sugar tax or a product reformulation are strongly supported among the public health community but may cause a considerable backlash (e.g. inspiring aversion to institutions initiating the interventions among citizens). Such a backlash potentially undermines future health-promotion strategies. This study aims to uncover whether such backlash exists | ||
| 520 | |a METHODS: We fielded a pre-registered randomized, population-based survey experiment among adults from the Longitudinal Internet Studies for the Social Sciences panel (n = 1765; based on a random sampling of the Dutch population register). Participants were randomly allocated to the control condition (brief facts about health-information provision/nudging), or one of two experimental groups (the same facts, expanded with either a proposed sugar tax on or reformulation of sugar-sweetened beverages). Ordinary least squares regression was used to estimate the proposed interventions' effects on four outcome variables: trust in health-promotion institutions involved; perceptions that these institutions have citizens' well-being in mind (i.e. benevolence); perceptions that these institutions' perspectives are similar to those of citizens (i.e. alignment of perspectives); and attitudes toward nutrition information | ||
| 520 | |a RESULTS: Trust, perceived benevolence and perceived alignment of perspectives were affected negatively by a proposed sugar tax (-0.24, 95% CI -0.38 to -0.10; -0.15, -0.29 to -0.01; -0.15, -0.30 to 0.00) or product reformulation (-0.32, -0.46 to -0.18; -0.24, -0.37 to -0.11; -0.18, 0.33 to -0.03), particularly among the non-tertiary educated respondents | ||
| 520 | |a CONCLUSIONS: Sugar taxes or product reformulations may delegitimize health-promotion institutions, potentially causing public distancing from or opposition to these bodies. This may be exploited by political and commercial parties to undermine official institutions | ||
| 520 | |a TRIAL REGISTRATION: https://osf.io/qr9jy/?view_only=5e2e875a1fc348f3b28115b7a3fdfd90. Registered 3 February 2022 | ||
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| 700 | 1 | |a de Koster, Willem |e verfasserin |4 aut | |
| 700 | 1 | |a van der Waal, Jeroen |e verfasserin |4 aut | |
| 700 | 1 | |a Oude Groeniger, Joost |e verfasserin |4 aut | |
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