Ultra-Processing and Nutritional Quality: Glycemic Response, Appetite, Dietary Energy Intake, and Eating Rate

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.

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.

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.

Blood glucose levels will be measured by capillary fingerstick using a safety lancet, tested with a glucometer (Freestyle Optium Neo (Abbot ©).

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.

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.

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.

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).

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).