Counting Calories or Confusion?

Did you realize that your perception about the “calorie” cost of a food could determine what you end up eating?
According to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research, researchers found out that
the sequence in which items are considered often influences our evaluations of these items.
In one of Dr. Chernev's studies, he found that a group of participants' impressions of how many calories a cheeseburger had depended on whether they were first shown a salad or the cheeseburger. The people who saw the cheeseburger first thought it had 570 calories, whereas the participants who first estimated the calories of the salad thought the cheeseburger had 787 calories—a 38 percent difference.

"Simply switching the order in which our respondents evaluated the two meals resulted in significant changes in their perceived calorie content," Chernev writes. Reversing the order in which the respondents considered the items also increased the overall calorie estimation from 757 to 1,097 calories.

When the foods are quite dissimilar (a "virtuous" salad versus an "indulgent" slice of cheesecake), people get even more confused about calories. Even though participants knew a fruit salad had fewer calories than a piece of cheesecake, they perceived a salad/cheeseburger sequence to have more calories than a cheesecake/cheeseburger combo.

Here’s the bottom line: If you tend to overestimate the calorie content of healthy/indulgent sequences of items, you are also likely to make healthier food choices based on that perception.

To what kind of food are you comparing your lunch choice today?

By Kim Dalzell, PhD, RD

www.naturesanswertocancer.com