Written By: Longjam Dineshwori | Updated : May 13, 2022 5:31 PM IST
People Tend To Eat Healthier In The Presence Of Strangers
A healthy diet accompanied by regular exercise is essential for attaining optimal health and well-being. Being active and eating healthier food can also keep lifestyle diseases, including heart disease and diabetes, at bay and thus increase your lifespan. But most of us struggle to maintain a healthy diet. We also can't deny that it is difficult to resist the temptation of junk foods, which are usually high in calories, unhealthy fats, and sugars. Eating outside? There's one situation when you're more likely to choose a healthy food option. This is when you're with strangers.
People choose healthier food in the presence of outsiders because they fear being judged negatively for their choices, according to a new study.
The study, co-authored by Bayes Business School, found that that the presence of individuals from different friendship or social groups influences people's food choices. This occurs because individuals anticipate more negative judgement from outsiders, the authors said.
For the study, the researchers spoke to around 1,000 individuals from different race, university, and field of work. They found that participants were more likely to choose a healthy snack in the presence of an observer of a different race (as opposed to the same race) or one affiliated with a different university (as opposed to their own university).
This was because people feel judged to a larger extent by outgroup members and they strategically use healthy food choices to make a positive impression to counter this negative judgement.
Four separate experiments also showed similar results.
Based on these findings, the researchers suggested that one way to promote a healthy diet could be to advertise the social benefits of healthy choices.
"We know that food plays an important role in social life and consumers often make inferences about others' traits and characteristics based on their food choices. Our research shows that we can use this important role of food for consumer welfare if we highlight that healthy food is not only good for consumers, but also helps them to impress others," said Dr Janina Steinmetz, Associate Professor (Reader) of Marketing at Bayes, as quoted by Science Daily.
Not only healthy eating is good for you and your health, but it's also good for making a positive impression, Dr Steinmetz concluded.
Dr Steinmetz noted that marketers of healthy foods and policy makers can use this strategy to promote healthy eating.
