Marketing matters when it comes to eating healthy, according to a new study published in JAMA Internal Medicine.
Researchers hypothesized health-focused labeling on nutritious foods actually drives people away because healthy foods are perceived to taste worse than indulgent foods. To test this hypothesis, they served a featured vegetable in a university cafeteria — prepared and served the same way each day — and varied how it was labeled: basic, healthy restrictive, healthy positive or indulgent.
They found labeling the vegetable as indulgent inspired 25 percent more diners to choose it than when it was labeled basic, 35 percent more than when it was labeled healthy positive and 41 percent more than when it was labeled healthy restrictive. They found no difference in consumption between the basic, healthy positive and healthy restrictive labels.
"Our results represent a robust, applicable strategy for increasing vegetable consumption in adults: using the same indulgent, exciting and delicious descriptors as more popular, albeit less healthy, foods," the authors wrote. "This novel, low-cost intervention could easily be implemented in cafeterias, restaurants, and consumer products to increase selection of healthier options."
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