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Many studies have shown that over-eating is highly influenced by environmental cues. Visual indicators such as a clean plate or the bottom of a bowl are often used by people as cues to stop eating. We hypothesized that inserting visual markers (segmentation cues) in a snack food package would reduce total intake within a single sitting.
In the first study, 59 college students were invited to watch a movie and have some chips while doing so. Each student was randomly given a tube of chips that was either normal (no red chips) or had a red chip at intervals of 7 or 14. At the end of the movie, the tubes were collected and the number of chips eaten was recorded. In a post survey, participants were asked to estimate how many chips they had eaten. A second study was conducted with 39 college students at a different University, where the red chip was flavored. In this case the red chips were segmented at every 5th or 10th chip.
We found that dividers significantly reduce how many chips a person ate. There was no significant difference between the 7-chip segment group and the 14-chip segment group, and together theses dividers reduced intake by 48.5% compared to the no divider group (control). Groups that had a divider were also significantly more accurate at predicting how many chips they had consumed (p<.001). The second study with the flavored chips had similar results reducing overall consumption by 43.3%. These results might be due to any or all of the following 3 mechanisms: a) it calls attention to and encourages better monitoring of eating, b) it suggests smaller consumption (portion size), or c) it breaks automated eating sequences by introducing a pause.
It is clear from these studies that marketing modest-sized portion size packages could be an effective strategy to reduce food intake and obesity.
Geier, Andrew, Brian Wansink, and Paul Rozin (2012). Red Potato Chips: Segmentation Cues Can Substantially Decrease Food Intake. Health Psychology, 31(3), 398-401. doi: 10.1037/a0027221