Do you buy foods because they claim to be "Low Fat"? What about "All Natural" and "Trans-Fat-Free"? These popular health claims are everywhere. I've always thought that they were helpful in making good food choices.
Apparently, I'm wrong. Numerous studies have shown that people (especially if they're already overweight) actually underestimate calories and eat more when they think that what they're eating is good for them.
What's going on? It could be that people mistakenly believe that low-fat means low calorie. Maybe they feel less guilty about eating something that sounds healthy. Researchers think that a low-fat label gives people the mental permission to eat more. It reminds me of my mother's logic: Using artificial sweetener in her coffee allowed her to eat a cookie (or two) with it.
There's more. A recent study found that just by calling a food "healthy" may make you feel hungrier. Two groups of college students were given the same snack bar to eat. Half of the group was told that they were eating a "health" bar high in nutrients. The other half were told that the snack bar contained chocolate and raspberry and was "tasty." Afterwards, those in the "healthy" group rated themselves as hungrier than those in the "tasty" group.
In another experiment, researchers offered students a choice of snack bars randomly described as either "healthy" or "tasty". When given a choice, there was no difference in the hunger level of the students afterwards. Free-choice seems to lead to a higher commitment to eating healthy food.
When people feel obligated to eat healthy foods, they tend to eat more. So much for nutrition education and food labeling. Those healthy food messages may be having the opposite effect!
What should you do?
These findings lead me back to some very basic advice. Eat real food. Be aware of what you eat and how much you're eating. And most important, enjoy what you eat. Savor a piece of high quality dark chocolate and skip the sugar-free candies. Toss your salad with olive oil and vinegar and pass up the fat-free salad dressing. Enjoy a small piece of cake made with real butter rather than eating half a bag of low-fat cookies.
I have no doubt that psychology influences choice, but there is a whole segment of the population that eat "sugar-free" not because if is advertised as healthy, but because they are diabetic and, even though they would much rather have something tasty and not necessarily healthy, self preservation tips the scales!!
ReplyDelete