Background: Use of nutrition facts labels can be associated with healthier eating behaviors; however, consumers currently face difficulty understanding these labels or do not use them often. Thus, improving healthy grocery shopping behaviors among consumers might increase the overall health of the community.
Aim: The study aims to explore consumers' behavior during grocery shopping and measure their basic knowledge regarding food product labels.
Method: A national observational study (cross-sectional) was carried out on a convenience sample of Saudi Arabian residents aged 18 years and above. The data were obtained from all 13 administrative regions in Saudi Arabia at three different major supermarkets in each region. The data were analyzed using descriptive analysis, and binary logistic regression was used to investigate behavior variables.
Results: A total of 12,675 participants were observed; of those, 52.2% did not interact with the product before putting it in their shopping cart. The study found that the production date (66.6%) and expiry date (51%) were the most frequently checked aspects of food labels; they were checked more frequently than nutrition facts (29%). Furthermore, there was a low level of dietary knowledge among consumers and a moderate level of believing food packages and media claims.
Conclusions: Our results suggest that the Saudi community's understanding of food product information is limited and greater awareness and community education campaigns are required to improve the use of nutritional labels and increase nutritional knowledge.
Keywords: Consumers; Saudi Arabia; behavior; nutrition; supermarkets.