A Nutrition Game-Based Technology Solution To Incite Children To Take Daily Breakfast From Healthy Food

Abstract

Many children in Qatar are going daily to school without taking their breakfast. They buy, however, unhealthy food from their schools, nearby shops or restaurants, which results in many health problems, like obesity and teeth decay. To overcome this problem, we propose a learning system that incites children to take their breakfast before going to school. The system is composed of two main components: 1) a video game and 2) an informative tool. The system enhances the children knowledge about healthy food with breakfast and shows the importance of exercising to have a healthy life. The game aims to develop children’s eating habits and help them to maintain ideal weight and become healthier. On the other hand, the diet informative component aims to help parents to select the right food for their children based on their health conditions. According to the assessments carried out on children of age 6 to 12, the results show that most of them intended to change their eating life style after playing the game. This shows that the proposed solution is promising and may have a significant impact on children’s health.