Psychologists may have found a trick to get people to eat healthier food
The difference between choosing an apple over a bag of Doritos may have to do with what's on the label.
Adults may be more likely to choose a healthy food when its label implies healthiness with a visual symbol, according to a new study.
When a food's label includes the word "healthy," on it, people are more likely to think it will taste worse than it actually does, says Traci Mann, PhD, who led the study and has studied the psychology of eating for two decades at the University of Minnesota.
Mann's team conducted the study at a Minneapolis hotel during a national academic convention. On the registration table, there were three different baskets: one with apples, one with bags of coffee beans, and one with candy bars. Attendees could take any of the options for free.
Mann rotated three different signs on the apple basket every 20 minutes over two days of the conference, surveying the choices of 369 adults. One explicitly called the apples "a healthy choice." Another implicitly called them healthy with the widely-recognizable heart-healthy symbol. The third sign simply read, "Honey Crisp Apples."
The participants were 63% more likely to choose apples over candy or coffee when the apple basket's sign featured the heart-healthy symbol, Mann tells Tech Insider. The medium-sized study is the first of its kind to her knowledge, and she hopes to perform a similar one with a larger sample.
Mann believes that the word, "healthy" may turn people off because they associate it with food that doesn't taste good, and don't like to be pressured to do things. They prefer to feel like they're making healthy food choices on their own.
"It sort of sounds like an order, like 'Do this healthy thing!' - even though it just said 'a healthy choice,'" Mann says. "People don't like to be told what to do."
The study could provide clues about what makes us more likely to choose simple fruits and vegetables over processed foods. As rates of obesity and heart disease escalate, the US Food and Drug Administration continues to try to find ways to encourage people to eat healthier. Last October, the FDA expressed interest in placing nutrition labels on the front of packages that include calories per serving and grams of fat. Mann says these labels may be ineffective because people find them difficult to understand.
A less complicated label may be the key.