A web-based gamification program to improve nutrition literacy in families of 3- to 5-year-old children: the Nutriscience Project

Objective: Assess the impact of a web-based gamification program on nutrition literacy of families and explore differences in impact by socioeconomic status. Design: Quasi-experimental. Setting: Thirty-seven kindergartens from Portugal. Participants: Eight hundred seventy-seven families. Intervention: Web-based social network of participants' interactions, educational materials, apps and nutritional challenges, focused on fruit, vegetables, sugar, and salt. Main Outcome Measures: Parental nutrition literacy (self-reported survey − 4 dimensions: Nutrients, Food portions, Portuguese food wheel groups, Food labeling). Analysis: General linear model − Repeated measures was used to analyze the effect on the nutrition literacy score. Results: Families uploaded 1267 items (recipes, photographs of challenges) and educators uploaded 327 items (photographs, videos) onto the interactive platform. For the intervention group (n = 106), the final mean (SD) score of nutrition literacy was significantly higher than the baseline: 78.8% (15.6) vs 72.7% (16.2); P