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Summary Psychobiology of Food Choice and Eating Behaviour (HNH30306)
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A summary of the course HNH30306 Psychobiology of Food Choice and Eating Behaviour
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Psychobiology of food choice and eating behaviourLecture 1 Models of food choice
Modelling food choice
First, what is food choice? That revers to the selection and consumption of food and beverages, but it
is not only about what we eat, but it is also about how much, when, with whom and where we eat.
Food choice is broader than only about what foods we eat. We can use several models to explain or
predict food choice:
- Existing models versus new models (deductive/inductive)
- Mono (single factor involved) versus multi-factorial
- Qualitative (more descriptive) versus quantitative models
What is important is to realize that models have strengths and weaknesses. They can do certain
things and they cannot do certain things. A strength is that a model can simplify complex matters. So,
you can isolate certain variables of interest and ignore the others, but this already indicates the
restriction of a model and that is the face-validity; how well does a model translate into the
complexity of the real world. There are different strengths and weaknesses for certain models.
Determinants of food choice
In chapter 2, there is a theory discussed about that the biggest determinant of what one eats is
availability. This may sound obviously, because you can eat what is there and not what is not there,
but there all kinds of determinants of what is available. Determinants of food choice/availability are
- Biological aspects
- Psychological aspects
- Social aspects
- Cultural aspects
Biology and food choice
How does biology relate to food choice? Humans have certain innate taste biases, an innate
preference for sweet tastes and an innate dislike for very bitter taste and to a certain extend sour.
This is kind of imprinted in our biology. Also, the omnivore’s dilemma (Rozin) is the idea that humans
are omnivores; so, we can eat and digest almost everything, but not everything is safe to eat or to
digest. That is why we are equipped with a complex system that balances between neophobia and
neophilia. Neophobia is a resistance to try out new food, so we are cautious when we encounter new
food what we have not eaten before and neophilia is that we have a natural curiosity and that we are
drawn to eat new food. This kind of balance avoids on the one hand that we are too eager to eat new
foods that can be dangerous to us, but we want to try out new food to create a larger variety in our
diet. If you compare this characteristic of omnivores, some animals have a very specific diet (panda
or koala), they don’t need such a complex system to guide their food choice behaviours. All they
need is a largely physiological system to recognize, detect and moving towards their source of food
and to ignore/reject all others. They don’t have this balance.
Psychology and food choice/consumption
How does psychology aspects influence our food choice and consumption behaviour? In a study, it
was shown that increasing the perceived variety of an assortment of food can increase our
consumption. In this study, people were invited to the lab and as a reward they had access to an
,assortment of 300 M&M candies, which were presented in either 7 or 10 different colours. The taste
was identical of each colour. Results:
Bowl with 300 M&M’s 7 colours 10 colours
Eaten over a 1h period 64 91
So, increasing the perceived variety (e.g., by more colours of candy), can increase consumption.
Sociology and food choice/eating behaviour
In ‘low income’ countries there is a low risk for obesity in the lower social classes because poor
people may simple not have the resources to overeat. In the ‘upper middle income’ countries there is
a high risk for obesity in lower social classes. This is an example of how sociological factors can affect
food choice and eating behaviour. Thus, the risk for obesity in lower social classes increases with
gross national product.
Culture and food choice
Culture is almost certainly the predominated influence. Culture is a very important factor. The most
informative question to ask someone is ‘Where do you live?’ to get information of someone’s eating
behaviour. The interesting thing about pictures of someone’s food is that it gives not only
information on what is being eating, but also about where it is eaten, how much and where –
restaurant, at home, with family, etc.
Food and food choice would be complex enough from the standpoint of nutrition, so that is finding
nutritional appropriate food and avoiding toxins, imbalances, and nutrient deficiencies. But for
humans, food is much more complicated as food has become an integrated part of many functions in
our daily life that has nothing to do with nutrition. Food and food choice can only be understood by a
mixture of biological, psychological, social, and cultural perspectives, all taken within a historical
context.
Food choice models
Food choice process model
This food choice process model approaches food choice over the life course. As people develop and
change over time, they are shaped by their environment and experiences and construct an individual
life course that involves past and current food choice and eating behaviours and experiences, as well
as expectations about the future food choices and experiences. In this model, food choices are seen
as dynamic and something that evolves over time/age.
,Example
This is a qualitative study by Devine and colleagues (1998), where they investigated the life-course
influences on choices of fruit and vegetable products and consumption. They had a sample of 86
people with a low to moderate income. The population was sampled across ethnic identity, age,
composition of the household, and gender. What they found, is that there is a series of personal and
environmental forces that shapes this fruit and vegetable trajectory over the life-course.
What they also found is that …
- Food upbringing
o Positive experiences → living on a farm, having a vegetable garden
o Negative experiences → being forced to eat vegetables as a child
- Roles + role transitions
o Marriage, divorce, employment, childbearing
- Health
o Acute and/or chronic illnesses, ageing, self/others
- Ethnic traditions
- Resources
o Perceived knowledge/skills, available time, space, money
- Food system
o Changing health and diet information, cultural trends in cuisine
Food choice process model over the life course
From studies like Devine et al. on food choice processes over the life course, some key concepts
emerge in peoples report how they construct food choice over time. One central concept is that of a
trajectory – individual food choice trajectory. These trajectories, according to the model, include a
person’s persistent thoughts, feelings, emotions, over the life span. Along the individual trajectory,
, one can identify transitions (early in life, later in life) and transitions are shifts in the persons life that
led to minor changes in food choice patterns. A turning point is a very radical transition, that has a
major impact on your food choice and pattern. Apart from these transitions and turning points, there
is context that represents the environments, in which life course changes occur, both at the macro
level (society, culture, economy, government) as well as at the micro level (the smaller circle in which
individuals operate in; families, friends, school, work, community).
- Example of change in macro context is the reduced salt content in bread
- Example of change in micro context is moving to a home where you have your own vegetable
garden
The next level in the model from the life course is influences, where as the life course provides a
framework for a variety of influences on our food choices. These influences in this model are
clustered into five groups: ideals, personal factors, resources, contexts, and social factors.
- Ideals: normative standards about what and how want you to eat, this is very much
engrained in culture or subcultural norms. For example, if you ask elderly people in the
Netherlands what a proper dinner meal looks like, they probably say something like meat,
vegetables, and potatoes – normative standard of how a good meal should be.
- Personal factors: involves a broad range of physiological and psychological or emotional
characteristics of the person that influence food choice and food preferences.
- Resources: things like budget for food, time to cook, cooking skills, transportation; how far
do you life from the shop/market.
- Social factors: the relationships we have with other people, influence our food choice →
family roles/household roles.
- Context: macro and micro context that can influence our food choice.
The next level is the Personal Food System, which is a translation of these influences on individual
food choices into how and what one eats in a situation.
When you look at the upper level of this triangle, then the personal food system includes the process
of constructing – food choice values. Thus, how does an individual develop certain food choice
values. It is also about the classifications of foods and situations according to these values. There is
something on value negotiations – what values may be prioritized in certain situations above others.
Balancing/competing values and developing strategies/short-cuts/rules of thumb for food selection
and eating in different situations.
These food choice values are a set of considerations that are important to a person in constructing
food choices. They are dynamic and change over time during the life-course. Experiences may shape
them, that may result in new/modified food choice values. So, the food choice values that you hold
can change over time or according to certain circumstances. Research has shown that there are 5
types of values that are important to almost everyone. These are:
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