An interventional study of Test Meals Differing in Processing Level and Nutritional Quality in Eating, Anxiety and Ultra Processed Food, sponsored by Ariel University. Recruiting at 1 site in Israel. Open to participants aged 18 Years to 39 Years, including healthy volunteers. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-09-09.
Sponsored by Ariel University · Not applicable, Interventional, and Basic science
The UPGRADE Study will examine how food-processing level and nutritional quality affect energy intake, eating rate, satiety, and glycemic response. In a randomized-order crossover design, each participant will consume three laboratory test meals: low processing/high nutritional quality, high processing/high nutritional quality, and high processing/low nutritional quality. Food intake and eating rate will be measured using a Universal Eating Monitor, alongside satiety, glycemic response, and energy intake during the remainder of the day.
The study will also explore whether anxiety and nutrition insecurity influence these responses. Comparisons between participants in Israel and the United States will assess whether background Mediterranean versus Western dietary patterns modify meal responses. The high-processing, low-nutritional-quality meal is expected to result in greater energy intake and eating rate, lower satiety, and a more pronounced glycemic response. Findings will inform future trials and dietary recommendations concerning ultra-processed foods and nutritional quality.
The UPGRADE Study will examine how food-processing level and nutritional quality independently influence eating behavior, energy intake, satiety, and postprandial glycemic response. Using a randomized-order crossover design, each participant will consume three test meals under laboratory conditions: (1) low processing and high nutritional quality; (2) high processing and high nutritional quality; and (3) high processing and low nutritional quality. This design will enable planned comparisons of the effect of processing level when nutritional quality is held constant and the effect of nutritional quality when processing level is held constant.
Each meal will be served on a Universal Eating Monitor, which continuously records the amount and rate of food consumption. Additionally, meal time will be recorded during each meal to allow overall meal time calculation. Primary outcomes will include energy intake during the test meal, meal duration, eating rate, postprandial satiety, and glycemic response. Dietary intake during the remainder of the day will also be assessed to determine whether the test meals affect subsequent energy intake.
The study will further investigate whether anxiety and nutrition insecurity are associated with eating behavior and whether they modify responses to meals differing in processing level and nutritional quality. Participants with elevated anxiety are hypothesized to consume more energy during the laboratory meals and throughout the remainder of the day.
The study will be conducted in Israel, permitting exploratory comparisons between populations exposed to different background dietary patterns. The predominantly Mediterranean-oriented dietary pattern in Israel may influence participants' acute responses to the experimental meals.
It is hypothesized that the high-processing, low-nutritional-quality meal will produce the highest energy intake and eating rate, the lowest satiety, the greatest subsequent energy intake, and the most pronounced glycemic response. By distinguishing the effects of food processing from those of nutritional quality, this study will provide preliminary mechanistic evidence to inform future randomized controlled trials and dietary recommendations concerning ultra-processed foods, diet quality, and chronic disease risk.
7,201 studies on the registry are indexed under Anxiety Disorders; 1,682 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 40 is below the median of 80 across 6,057 interventional studies indexed under Anxiety Disorders.
Browse Anxiety Disorders studies →Ariel University is the lead sponsor of 29 studies on the registry; 6 are open to participants now.
Compared within Anxiety Disorders, the registry's first condition term, which may not be this study's main condition. Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily. How we classify →
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Exclusion Criteria:
Underlined terms in the criteria open these too. Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Weight in kilograms divided by height in metres squared. Example: 70 kg and 1.75 m gives 70 ÷ (1.75 × 1.75) ≈ 22.9.
What counts as overweight or obesity differs between countries (some use lower cut-offs), so go by the range the study states.
BMI (body mass index)
Weight in kilograms divided by height in metres squared. Example: 70 kg and 1.75 m gives 70 ÷ (1.75 × 1.75) ≈ 22.9.
What counts as overweight or obesity differs between countries (some use lower cut-offs), so go by the range the study states.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Participants will receive the low-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 1, the high-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 2, and the high-processing/low-nutritional-quality meal in Period 3. At each laboratory visit, food intake and eating rate will be recorded using the Universal Eating Monitor; satiety, postprandial glycemic response, and subsequent dietary intake will also be assessed.
Other: Test Meals Differing in Processing Level and Nutritional Quality
Participants will receive the low-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 1, the high-processing/low-nutritional-quality meal in Period 2, and the high-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 3. At each laboratory visit, food intake and eating rate will be recorded using the Universal Eating Monitor; satiety, postprandial glycemic response, and subsequent dietary intake will also be assessed.
Other: Test Meals Differing in Processing Level and Nutritional Quality
Participants will receive the high-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 1, the low-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 2, and the high-processing/low-nutritional-quality meal in Period 3. At each laboratory visit, food intake and eating rate will be recorded using the Universal Eating Monitor; satiety, postprandial glycemic response, and subsequent dietary intake will also be assessed.
Other: Test Meals Differing in Processing Level and Nutritional Quality
Participants will receive the high-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 1, the high-processing/low-nutritional-quality meal in Period 2, and the low-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 3. At each laboratory visit, food intake and eating rate will be recorded using the Universal Eating Monitor; satiety, postprandial glycemic response, and subsequent dietary intake will also be assessed.
Other: Test Meals Differing in Processing Level and Nutritional Quality
Participants will receive the high-processing/low-nutritional-quality meal in Period 1, the low-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 2, and the high-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 3. At each laboratory visit, food intake and eating rate will be recorded using the Universal Eating Monitor; satiety, postprandial glycemic response, and subsequent dietary intake will also be assessed.
Other: Test Meals Differing in Processing Level and Nutritional Quality
Participants will receive the high-processing/low-nutritional-quality meal in Period 1, the high-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 2, and the low-processing/high-nutritional-quality meal in Period 3. At each laboratory visit, food intake and eating rate will be recorded using the Universal Eating Monitor; satiety, postprandial glycemic response, and subsequent dietary intake will also be assessed.
Other: Test Meals Differing in Processing Level and Nutritional Quality
Interventions: Three distinct meal interventions and six randomized sequence arms. The six arms differ only in intervention order. The meals are: LP-HNQ Meal: Low-processing, high-nutritional-quality test meal consumed under standardized laboratory conditions. HP-HNQ Meal: High-processing, high-nutritional-quality test meal consumed under standardized laboratory conditions. HP-LNQ Meal: High-processing, low-nutritional-quality test meal consumed under standardized laboratory conditions.
Total meal duration
Total meal duration, expressed in minutes and seconds, will be determined from the video recording as the elapsed time between placement of the meal tray on the table and the participant indicating that they have finished eating and leaving the table.
Time frame: During each test meal, from placement of the meal tray on the table until the participant indicates that they have finished eating and leaves the table (approximately 5-20 minutes; assessed once per test meal).
Total energy intake in a test meal
At each laboratory visit, participants will receive one of the test meals. Total energy intake (kcal) will be calculated by subtracting the post-meal weight from the pre-meal weight of each food item, multiplying the amount consumed (g) by the item's energy density (kcal/g), and summing the energy consumed across all meal items.
Time frame: During each test meal (approximately 5-20 minutes; assessed once per test meal).
Self-reported level of satiety
Satiety will be assessed using a 10-point numerical visual analogue scale ranging from 1 ("not full at all") to 10 ("extremely full"). Higher scores indicate greater perceived satiety.
Time frame: At each laboratory visit: immediately before the test meal, at meal termination, and 60 minutes after meal termination (assessment period of approximately 60-80 minutes).
Blood glucose level
Blood glucose levels will be measured by capillary fingerstick using a safety lancet, tested with a glucometer (Freestyle Optium Neo (Abbot ©).
Time frame: Measures will be taken at each lab visit at time 0 (prior to consuming the meal) and at times 30, 60 90 and 120 minutes after the meal.
Height
Standing height will be measured without shoes, to the nearest 0.1 cm, using a calibrated wall-mounted stadiometer. Participants will stand upright with their head positioned in the Frankfort horizontal plane. Two measurements will be obtained, and their mean will be used in the analysis. If the two measurements differ by more than 0.5 cm, a third measurement will be obtained.
Time frame: Once at the first laboratory visit (baseline), between 8:00 and 10:00 a.m.; measurement takes approximately 5 minutes.
Weight
Body weight will be measured without shoes and while wearing light clothing, to the nearest 0.1 kg, using the InBody 770 body-composition analyzer. Participants will stand upright and remain still during the measurement.
Time frame: Once at the first laboratory visit (baseline), between 8:00 and 10:00 a.m.; measurement takes approximately 5 minutes.
Anxiety
Anxiety will be measured using the Hebrew Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)-7 scale (Löwe, Decker \& Müller et al, 2008). Participants rate how frequently they experienced each symptom during the preceding two weeks on a scale from 0 ("not at all") to 3 ("nearly every day"). Item scores are summed to produce a total score ranging from 0 to 21, with higher scores indicating greater anxiety symptom severity. Scores of 5, 10, and 15 represent thresholds for mild, moderate, and severe anxiety symptoms, respectively.
Time frame: Once at the first laboratory visit (baseline); the questionnaire assesses symptoms experienced during the preceding two weeks and takes approximately 2-5 minutes to complete.
Household food insecurity risk
Household food insecurity risk will be assessed using the Hunger Vital Sign™, a validated two-item screening tool derived from the U.S. Household Food Security Survey Module. Participants will report whether each statement was "often true," "sometimes true," or "never true" during the preceding 12 months. A positive screen-indicating risk of household food insecurity-will be defined as a response of "often true" or "sometimes true" to either or both items. Participants responding "never true" to both items will be classified as not at risk (Hager et al., 2010).
Time frame: Once at the first laboratory visit (baseline); the questionnaire assesses experiences during the preceding 12 months and takes approximately 2-5 minutes to complete.
Adherence to the Israeli Mediterranean diet pattern
Adherence will be assessed using the 17-item Israel Mediterranean Diet Adherence Screener (I-MEDAS), adapted to reflect the Israeli Mediterranean dietary pattern and national dietary recommendations. Each item is scored 0 or 1 according to whether the specified dietary criterion is met. Scores are summed to produce a total score ranging from 0 to 17, with higher scores indicating greater adherence to the Mediterranean dietary pattern (Abu-Saad et al., 2019).
Time frame: At baseline, before the first test-meal session. The I-MEDAS assesses habitual current dietary intake using item-specific daily or weekly consumption frequencies; it does not employ one uniform retrospective recall period.
Plan to share: No — Individual participant data will not be shared because the informed consent and ethics approval did not include provisions for sharing participant-level data with external researchers. In addition, the relatively small study sample and the sensitive nature of the collected health and dietary information may create a risk of participant re-identification, even after de-identification. Study findings will be reported in aggregate form.
Start is estimated for Sep 2026; primary completion for Sep 2027, 12 months later.
Of 3,836 non-industry interventional studies with no phase under Anxiety Disorders, half reached primary completion within 12 months of starting (the median), counting those still running; a quarter within 5 and three quarters within 28. This study's planned 12 months is close to that.
Counting every sponsor, half of 3,938 studies reached it within 12 months; a quarter within 5 and three quarters within 28.
How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.
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