"Why do the Recommendations Keep Changing?" A Randomized Controlled Trial of a Scrollytelling Web Application to Help Members of the Public Understand Better How and Why Public Health Guidelines Change Over Time

"Why do the Recommendations Keep Changing?" A Randomized Controlled Trial of a Scrollytelling Web Application to Help Members of the Public Understand Better How and Why Public Health Guidelines Change Over Time

This study will be an online 3-arm randomized controlled trial. Here intervention group 1 will receive the intervention in the form of an animated cartoon "scrollytelling" outlining the various changes and reasons for changes in public health guidelines in the context of nutrition (e.g. recommendations on fat intake). Intervention group 2 will have a scrollytelling on the reasons why public health recommendations always change in the context of infectious disease control (e.g. during the COVID-19 pandemic). And finally, the control group will receive no intervention.

The project was initially conceived on Figma, a design platform, enabling our design team to create a user interface. Following this design phase, our experienced developers took over, using the Vue.js framework. Development involved fundamental web languages: JavaScript, CSS and HTML. JavaScript made the interface dynamic for smooth user interaction, CSS applied the detailed visual design conceived on Figma, and HTML structured the application's content. This combination resulted in an application, showcasing Vue.js's effectiveness in application development. Our intervention was the "Changing" application, which was a scrollytelling that, in its two versions (food and pandemic), explained why and how public health guidelines are being changed. The main purpose of the "Changing" application is to explain the reasons for ongoing changes in public health guidelines, using COVID-19 and nutrition as examples.

Inclusion Criteria:

• We will recruit participants who are aged 18 years or older. They will be able to provide written informed consent, and be able to read and understand French or English. Additionally, they should be able to use a computer.

Exclusion Criteria:

• We will exclude participants who are younger than 18 years old, unable to provide written informed consent, unable to read or understand French or English, or unable to use a computer.