The "social" facilitation of eating without the presence of others: Self-reflection on eating makes food taste better and people eat more

Physiology & Behavior
Ryuzaburo Nakata, Nobuyuki Kawai

Abstract

Food tastes better and people eat more of it when eaten with company than alone. Although several explanations have been proposed for this social facilitation of eating, they share the basic assumption that this phenomenon is achieved by the existence of co-eating others. Here, we demonstrate a similar "social" facilitation of eating in the absence of other individuals. Elderly participants tasted a piece of popcorn alone while in front of a mirror (which reflects the participant themselves eating popcorn) or in front of a wall-reflecting monitor, and were found to eat more popcorn and rate it better tasting in the self-reflecting condition than in the monitor condition. Similar results were found for younger adults. The results suggest that the social facilitation of eating does not necessarily require the presence of another individual. Furthermore, we observed a similar "social" facilitation of eating even when participants ate a piece of popcorn in front of a static picture of themselves eating, suggesting that static visual information of "someone" eating food is sufficient to produce the "social" facilitation of eating.

Citations

Aug 23, 2019·The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition·Helen K RuddockSuzanne Higgs
Oct 28, 2019·Frontiers in Psychology·Charles SpenceGijs Huisman
Jan 24, 2020·Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience·Leslie TricocheMartine Meunier
Oct 31, 2020·International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health·Ai TashiroYoshiharu Fukuda
Apr 4, 2021·International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health·Amanda BjörnwallNicklas Neuman
Dec 21, 2020·Social Science & Medicine·Karine Charry, Tina Tessitore
Apr 24, 2021·Frontiers in Psychology·Tjark AndersenQian Janice Wang
Jun 1, 2021·Physiology & Behavior·Nobuyuki KawaiRyuzaburo Nakata

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