Young Eun Huh

Thought for Food: Imagined Consumption Reduces Actual Consumption

All in the Mind Pavlovs experiments, in which dogs salivate in anticipation of food, mirror our own imagined experience; that is, thinking about the future consumption of chocolate enhances our desire for it and our motivation to obtain it. After several bites, however, our appetite usually wanes and the offer of a second bar is less appealing than the first. Morewedge et al. (p. 1530) show that the decrease in hedonic response can also be induced by having imagined eating the first bar of chocolate. In comparisons of subjects asked to imagine the repetitive consumption of candy or cheese, they observed a specific drop in the amount consumed when subjects were actually offered the previously imagined foods to eat. Imagining eating a food caused subsequent actual consumption of that food to decline. The consumption of a food typically leads to a decrease in its subsequent intake through habituation—a decrease in one’s responsiveness to the food and motivation to obtain it. We demonstrated that habituation to a food item can occur even when its consumption is merely imagined. Five experiments showed that people who repeatedly imagined eating a food (such as cheese) many times subsequently consumed less of the imagined food than did people who repeatedly imagined eating that food fewer times, imagined eating a different food (such as candy), or did not imagine eating a food. They did so because they desired to eat it less, not because they considered it less palatable. These results suggest that mental representation alone can engender habituation to a stimulus.

Social Defaults: Observed Choices Become Choice Defaults

Defaults effects can be created by social contexts. The observed choices of others can become social defaults, increasing their choice share. Social default effects are a novel form of social influence not due to normative or informational influence: participants were more likely to mimic observed choices when choosing in private than in public (experiment 1) and when stakes were low rather than high (experiment 2). Like other default effects, social default effects were greater for uncertain rather than certain choices (experiment 3) and were weaker when choices required justification (experiment 4). Social default effects appear to occur automatically as they become stronger when cognitive resources are constrained by time pressure or load, and they can be sufficiently strong to induce preference reversals (experiments 5 and 6).

More Similar but Less Satisfying Comparing Preferences for and the Efficacy of Within- and Cross-Category Substitutes for Food

When people cannot get what they want, they often satisfy their desire by consuming a substitute. Substitutes can originate from within the taxonomic category of the desired stimulus (i.e., within-category substitutes) or from a different taxonomic category that serves the same basic goal (i.e., cross-category substitutes). Both a store-brand chocolate (within-category substitute) and a granola bar (cross-category substitute), for example, can serve as substitutes for gourmet chocolate. Here, we found that people believe that within-category substitutes, which are more similar to desired stimuli, will more effectively satisfy their cravings than will cross-category substitutes (Experiments 1, 2a, and 2b). However, because within-category substitutes are more similar than cross-category substitutes to desired stimuli, they are more likely to evoke an unanticipated negative contrast effect. As a result, unless substitutes are equivalent in quality to the desired stimulus, cross-category substitutes more effectively satisfy cravings for the desired stimulus (Experiments 3 and 4).

Selective Sensitization: Consuming a Food Activates a Goal to Consume Its Complements

Eating a food reduces the desire to eat more of that food. General-process theories of motivation posit that eating a food also increases the motivation to eat other foods—an effect known as cross-stimulus sensitization. The authors propose that eating a food selectively sensitizes consumers to its complements rather than to all foods. Eating a food activates a goal to consume foods that consumers perceive to be well paired with the consumed food. In five experiments, imagined and actual consumption of a food sensitized participants to complementary foods but not to unrelated or semantically associated foods. These findings suggest that cross-stimulus sensitization is more specific and predictable than previously assumed. The authors identify goal activation as the process through which cross-stimulus sensitization occurs and can be instilled.

Taste Perception and Creativity: An Abstract

Taste perception plays a key role in consumers’ food decisions (see Drewnowski 1997 for a review). It affects not only food preferences and choices but also the amount of food intake and eating habits. Among the four basic tastes (i.e., sweet, sour, salty, and bitter), sweet taste is innately favored (Keskitalo et al. 2007) and linked to a source of energy (Malik et al. 2006). But would consuming sweet food or drinks benefit any kinds of creative tasks? We examine how different tastes influence performance on a task that requires creativity. Specifically, we show that although consumers prefer to have sweet taste for a creativity task, sour taste actually enhances performance on a creativity task better than sweet taste. This beneficial effect of sour taste is due to its cognitive association with creativity.