Personalising dietary advice to promote health

Whether you are a food manufacturer, retailer, caterer or policymaker, the chances are that you’ve heard of Personalised Nutrition (PN). A personalised dietary approach helps people make healthy and sustainable food choices in a way that best suits them. These are choices that both optimise their health and fit their personality and social environment. This approach is very useful in this era of personalisation, where consumers increasingly want to be in control of their own health and wellbeing.

As a food industry player or policymaker, you may be grappling with the challenge of steering consumer choices towards a path of long-term wellbeing. What will motivate users to adopt and sustain their use of your products? How should the communication strategy for a PN app be designed for optimal user engagement? And what personal, lifestyle and behavioural factors contribute to the success of personalised advice? We deliver the answers to these questions and more, resulting in actionable insights.

Explore our impact

How do we support companies in successfully bringing personalised products and services to the market, such as food apps, personalised recipes or shopping lists?

We provide guidance during the development process to ensure an optimal fit with potential users, such as appropriateness, relevance and fit for purpose. We can involve consumers in co-creation steps, evaluate different prototypes, pre-screen several concepts, and assess post-launch effectiveness.

How do we support policy makers, health services and other public entities, and non-governmental organisations to enhance health promotion through dietary advice?

We offer support in making general nutrition guidelines more tailored and applicable so that consumers are more willing to follow them. We can also provide guidance in improving vitality programmes in schools, hospitals et cetera. Furthermore, we conduct research on the ethical dilemmas of personalised nutrition, such as one’s privacy.

The missing link in Personalised Nutrition

Current approaches fall short in addressing the personalised needs of individuals, hindering the widespread adoption of healthier, more sustainable diets. While most Personalised Nutrition research fixates on medical and biological dimensions, crucial behavioural insights often remain untapped. Understanding consumer acceptance, motivations and barriers, besides optimising communication, is vital to the success of Personalised Nutrition initiatives.

Empowering change through behavioural insights

We offer everything you need in terms of the behavioural aspect of Personalised Nutrition. We provide actionable insights to guide you in launching successful personalised products and services. And we help shape policies that widen access to personalised dietary and health services.

We have developed a unique consumer research framework to:

Measure consumer acceptance of Personalised Nutrition, such as motivations and barriers
Extract behavioural and psychosocial aspects that may help with the formulation of personalised dietary advice, e.g. food habits and preferences
Optimise communication and presentation of personalised dietary advice, combined with relevant techniques to target behavioural change

Why choose the Wageningen consumer research group?

Behavioural focus: with our expertise we hone in on the behavioural side of Personalised Nutrition – a distinctive approach in the field
Interdisciplinary network: we are part of a world-leading network at WUR, merging social sciences, data science, and nutrition & health science
Profound expertise in successful, long-term eating behaviour change backed by science