TY - JOUR
T1 - The influence of supraliminal priming on energy density of food selection
T2 - a randomised control trial
AU - Schlegel, Isabelle
AU - Carstairs, Sharon A.
AU - Ozakinci, Gozde
N1 - Funding Information:
We would like to thank the University of St Andrews Athletic Union for granting us permission to use their facilities for our primary data collection. Finally, we would like to thank the Directors of Hockey and Football for their communication with their student athletes to facilitate our recruitment of these individuals to this study.
Funding Information:
This research was funded by the University of St Andrews and did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors. The University of St Andrews provided the opportunity for this study to take place in the form of the dissertation project of IS’ BSc (Hons) Medicine degree. This study was designed and run by IS (undergraduate student) and two academic supervisors (SC and GO), both researchers at the university. The university granted the researchers permission to collect data in the university’s sports centre and provided a safe location for identifiable data to be stored before being destroyed. The researchers were also given access to IBM SPSS Statistics software for data analysis under the university’s licence.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, The Author(s).
PY - 2021/3/23
Y1 - 2021/3/23
N2 - Background: Many people exercise because they know it is good for their health. Although this is true, it can make us feel deserving of a reward and lead us to eat more indulgent, less healthy food than if we had not done any exercise. Generally, lower energy-dense (LED) foods are recognised as healthier choices than higher energy-dense (HED) options. Despite our intention to make healthy choices, seeing tempting higher-calorie foods on offer often side-tracks us. Priming is a psychological tool that makes specific changes to our environment that remind us of our motivation to be healthy. This makes it easier to choose a healthier option, by nudging us towards it without us even realising. However, it is currently unclear which method of priming achieves the best results. Aims: Our study explores whether priming people to expect they will receive LED food leads them to make this healthier choice after exercise, even when also offered tempting less healthy HED foods at the moment of selection. Methods: Our study observed the foods selected by university athletes after their sports matches. Before the match, half of the participants were primed by asking them to choose a LED snack from the options we offered, which they would receive after the match. The remaining half of participants were not asked this same question. To distract the athletes from our observation of their food choices, participants completed a task prior to choosing their snack, which was disguised as a ‘thank you’ for taking part. Results: Overall, we found the priming group did not choose LED foods significantly more than the control group, hence priming did not increase LED food selection. Conclusion: Importantly, our results indicate that priming must be more noticeable to achieve its goal. Additionally, we demonstrated that priming may be less successful for young athletic individuals, compared to older and more overweight adults recruited in other studies. This highlights the importance of studying a broader demographic range of individuals from the general population. We support future research into this area, which will help us to tweak priming to achieve the best outcomes. Trial registration: ISRCTN Registry, ISRCTN74601698. Date registered: 02/10/2020 (retrospectively registered).
AB - Background: Many people exercise because they know it is good for their health. Although this is true, it can make us feel deserving of a reward and lead us to eat more indulgent, less healthy food than if we had not done any exercise. Generally, lower energy-dense (LED) foods are recognised as healthier choices than higher energy-dense (HED) options. Despite our intention to make healthy choices, seeing tempting higher-calorie foods on offer often side-tracks us. Priming is a psychological tool that makes specific changes to our environment that remind us of our motivation to be healthy. This makes it easier to choose a healthier option, by nudging us towards it without us even realising. However, it is currently unclear which method of priming achieves the best results. Aims: Our study explores whether priming people to expect they will receive LED food leads them to make this healthier choice after exercise, even when also offered tempting less healthy HED foods at the moment of selection. Methods: Our study observed the foods selected by university athletes after their sports matches. Before the match, half of the participants were primed by asking them to choose a LED snack from the options we offered, which they would receive after the match. The remaining half of participants were not asked this same question. To distract the athletes from our observation of their food choices, participants completed a task prior to choosing their snack, which was disguised as a ‘thank you’ for taking part. Results: Overall, we found the priming group did not choose LED foods significantly more than the control group, hence priming did not increase LED food selection. Conclusion: Importantly, our results indicate that priming must be more noticeable to achieve its goal. Additionally, we demonstrated that priming may be less successful for young athletic individuals, compared to older and more overweight adults recruited in other studies. This highlights the importance of studying a broader demographic range of individuals from the general population. We support future research into this area, which will help us to tweak priming to achieve the best outcomes. Trial registration: ISRCTN Registry, ISRCTN74601698. Date registered: 02/10/2020 (retrospectively registered).
KW - Compensatory eating
KW - Energy density
KW - Exercise
KW - Priming
KW - Visual cues
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85103195748&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1186/s40359-021-00554-1
DO - 10.1186/s40359-021-00554-1
M3 - Article
C2 - 33757601
AN - SCOPUS:85103195748
SN - 2050-7283
VL - 9
JO - BMC Psychology
JF - BMC Psychology
IS - 1
M1 - 48
ER -