The objective of this study was to develop mobile phone application for image-based dietary assessment and evaluate satisfaction regarding respondent's use of the mobile phone application.

We developed a mobile phone application to assess dietary intakes using 24 hour dietary recall. After initial development, application was reviewed by ten adults and revised based on their comments. We recruited 192 volunteers (92 males, 100 females) to use the mobile phone application and to respond to a satisfaction survey. Participants were instructed to use the mobile phone application with fiducial marker five centimeter in width, length and two centimeter height at each eating occasion during designated 4 days, capturing 45° angle and 90° angle images of all food and beverage items before and after consumption. After using the mobile phone application for 4 days, participants were asked to complete an online questionnaire on the satisfaction of the mobile phone app. User satisfaction items composed of 12 questions of application user interface, 8 questions of emotional response, 9 questions of eating behavior in 5 likert scale. Participants were also asked to provide additional open-ended comments on the use of mobile phone application. Statistical analysis was performed by using the SPSS 23.0 (Statistical Package for the Social Science).

The average user interface score was 2.82 ± 1.08, which was close to the ‘normal’ response. Responses for emotion and eating behavior also were borderline to the ‘normal’.

This study found that the mobile phone application using 24-hour recall was acceptable to be used to assess dietary intakes for several days. However, there should be a need for such technology to be user-oriented instead of researcher-oriented. Easy and cost-effective new technology is needed for estimating the amounts of food eaten automatically when the photos are taken.