A study by Marcela Bomfim and Drs. Jim Wallace, Sharon Kirkpatrick, and Lennart Nacke received an Honourable Mention Award from CHI 2020, one of the most prestigious Human-Computer Interaction conferences in the world. The article, Food Literacy while Shopping: Making Informed Food Decisions with a Situated Gameful App, presents findings about how a gamified food literacy app (Pirate Bri’s Grocery Adventure) improved participant’s healthy eating behaviours.
Designed by lead author Marcela Bomfim, Pirate Bri's Grocery Adventure tested the effectiveness of using game elements to teach players about food literacy while they’re grocery shopping. The authors found that participants who used the app over a 3-week period made more nutritious food purchasing decisions and curbed unhealthy impulse buys than the non-game app control.
The research was also featured by Waterloo Stories in their article “Game apps help people make healthy choices at the grocery store”.