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The C.A.N (Convenient, Attractive, Normal) approach to eating behavior reveals three different ways or strategies that consumer psychology can be used to provide an organized framework to help people make healthier food choices. The C is for convenient, the A is for attractive, and the N is for normal. The idea was researched and created by Brian Wansink, Director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab and others at Cornell University. The researchers reviewed over 100 studies and found three things help people choose healthier foods. The food must be convenient (C), attractive (A) and normal (N), or CAN. The idea behind the CAN approach is to make foods like fruits and vegetables visible and easy to reach (convenient), nicely displayed (attractive), and look like a good choice (normal). In a study, published in Psychology and Marketing, showed that when fruit is put in a nice bowl in your home on the counter—it becomes more convenient, attractive, and normal to grab a banana or orange, rather than the chocolate ice cream in the hidden back of the freezer. Therefore, the CAN idea helps make healthier eating choices easier. The results of this study are intended to help consumers make healthier decisions by adjusting the way they select and serve their food. The authors suggest these organizational frameworks can be used to show how research can help transform consumer eating environments.
An article on cbsnews.com describes the research as more helpful then willpower alone to help lose weight and eat healthier. [1]
Behavior or behaviour is the range of actions and mannerisms made by individuals, organisms, systems, or artificial entities in conjunction with themselves or their environment, which includes the other systems or organisms around as well as the (inanimate) physical environment. It is the computed response of the system or organism to various stimuli or inputs, whether internal or external, conscious or subconscious, overt or covert, and voluntary or involuntary.
Behavioral economics studies the effects of psychological, cognitive, emotional, cultural and social factors on the economic decisions of individuals and institutions and how those decisions vary from those implied by classical theory.
The halo effect is a type of immediate judgement discrepancy, or cognitive bias, where a person making an initial assessment of another person, place, or thing will assume ambiguous information based upon concrete information. A simplified example of the halo effect is when an individual noticing that the person in the photograph is attractive, well groomed, and properly attired, assumes, using a mental heuristic, that the person in the photograph is a good person based upon the rules of that individual's social concept. This constant error in judgment is reflective of the individual's preferences, prejudices, ideology, aspirations, and social perception. The halo effect is an evaluation by an individual and can affect the perception of a decision, action, idea, business, person, group, entity, or other whenever concrete data is generalized or influences ambiguous information.
Consumer behaviour is the study of individuals, groups, or organizations and all the activities associated with the purchase, use and disposal of goods and services, including the consumer's emotional, mental and behavioural responses that precede or follow these activities. Consumer behaviour emerged in the 1940s and 50s as a distinct sub-discipline in the marketing area.
Self-control, an aspect of inhibitory control, is the ability to regulate one's emotions, thoughts, and behavior in the face of temptations and impulses. As an executive function, self-control is a cognitive process that is necessary for regulating one's behavior in order to achieve specific goals.
Buyer's remorse is the sense of regret after having made a purchase. It is frequently associated with the purchase of an expensive item such as a vehicle or real estate.
Ego depletion refers to the idea that self-control or willpower draws upon a limited pool of mental resources that can be used up. When the energy for mental activity is low, self-control is typically impaired, which would be considered a state of ego depletion. In particular, experiencing a state of ego depletion impairs the ability to control oneself later on. A depleting task requiring self-control can have a hindering effect on a subsequent self-control task, even if the tasks are seemingly unrelated. Self-control plays a valuable role in the functioning of the self on both individualistic and interpersonal levels. Ego depletion is therefore a critical topic in experimental psychology, specifically social psychology, because it is a mechanism that contributes to the understanding of the processes of human self-control. There have both been studies to support and to question the validity of ego-depletion as a theory.
Brian Wansink is an American researcher and professor who works in consumer behavior and marketing research. He is the former executive director of the USDA's Center for Nutrition Policy and Promotion (CNPP) (2007–2009) and held the John S. Dyson Endowed Chair in the Applied Economics and Management Department at Cornell University, where he directed the Cornell Food and Brand Lab.
Marketing ethics is an area of applied ethics which deals with the moral principles behind the operation and regulation of marketing. Some areas of marketing ethics overlap with media ethics.
Food marketing brings together the food producer and the consumer through a chain of marketing activities.
Advertising to children is the act of marketing or advertising products or services to children as defined by national legislation and advertising standards. It is often the subject of debate, relating to the alleged influence on little children's consumption. Laws concerning such advertisements have largely evolved in recent years such as the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) in the United States. In most countries, advertising to small children is framed by a mix of legislation and advertising self-regulation.
Choice architecture is the design of different ways in which choices can be presented to consumers, and the impact of that presentation on consumer decision-making. For example, the number of choices presented, the manner in which attributes are described, and the presence of a "default" can all influence consumer choice. As a result, advocates of libertarian paternalism and asymmetric paternalism have endorsed the deliberate design of choice architecture to nudge consumers toward personally and socially desirable behaviors like saving for retirement, choosing healthier foods, or registering as an organ donor. These interventions are often justified by the fact that well-designed choice architectures can compensate for irrational decision-making biases to improve consumer welfare. These techniques have consequently become popular among policymakers, leading to the creation of the UK's Behavioural Insights Team and White House "Nudge Unit" for example. While many behavioral scientists stress that there is no neutral choice architecture and that consumers maintain autonomy and freedom of choice despite manipulations of choice architecture, critics of libertarian paternalism often argue that choice architectures designed to overcome irrational decision biases may impose costs on rational agents, for example by limiting choice or undermining respect for individual human agency and moral autonomy.
Consumer neuroscience is the combination of consumer research with modern neuroscience. The goal of the field is to find neural explanations for consumer behaviors in individuals both with or without disease.
Research into food choice investigates how people select the food they eat. An interdisciplinary topic, food choice comprises psychological and sociological aspects, economic issues and sensory aspects.
Criticism of fast food includes claims of negative health effects, animal cruelty, cases of worker exploitation, children targeted marketing and claims of cultural degradation via shifts in people's eating patterns away from traditional foods. Fast food chains have come under fire from consumer groups, such as the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a longtime fast food critic over issues such as caloric content, trans fats and portion sizes. Social scientists have highlighted how the prominence of fast food narratives in popular urban legends suggests that modern consumers have an ambivalent relationship with fast food, particularly in relation to children.
In decision making and psychology, decision fatigue refers to the deteriorating quality of decisions made by an individual after a long session of decision making. It is now understood as one of the causes of irrational trade-offs in decision making. For instance, judges in court have been shown to make poorer quality decisions late in the day than they do early in the day. Decision fatigue may also lead to consumers making poor choices with their purchases.
Nutrition psychology (NP) is the psychological study of how cognitive choices, such as meal decisions, influence nutrition, psychological health, and overall health. Nutrition psychology seeks to understand the relationship between nutritional behavior and mental health/well-being. NP is a sub-field of psychology and more specifically of health psychology. It may be applied to numerous different fields including: psychology, dietetics, nutrition, and marketing. NP is a fairly new field with a brief history that has already started to contribute information and knowledge to psychology. There are two main areas of controversy within nutrition psychology. The first area of controversy is that the topic can be viewed in two different ways. It can be viewed as nutrition affecting psychological functions, or psychological choices and behavior influencing nutrition and health. The second controversy being the defining of what is "healthy" or "normal" as related to nutrition.
A context effect is an aspect of cognitive psychology that describes the influence of environmental factors on one's perception of a stimulus. The impact of context effects is considered to be part of top-down design. The concept is supported by the theoretical approach to perception known as constructive perception. Context effects can impact our daily lives in many ways such as word recognition, learning abilities, memory, and object recognition. It can have an extensive effect on marketing and consumer decisions. For example, research has shown that the comfort level of the floor that shoppers are standing on while reviewing products can affect their assessments of product's quality, leading to higher assessments if the floor is comfortable and lower ratings if it is uncomfortable. Because of effects such as this, context effects are currently studied predominantly in marketing.
The psychology of eating meat is a complex area of study illustrating the confluence of morality, emotions, cognition, and personality characteristics. Research into the psychological and cultural factors of meat eating suggests correlations with masculinity; support for hierarchical values; and reduced openness to experience. Because meat eating is widely practiced but is sometimes associated with ambivalence, it has been used as a case study in moral psychology to illustrate theories of cognitive dissonance and moral disengagement. Research into the consumer psychology of meat is relevant both to meat industry marketing and to advocates of reduced meat consumption.
Demarketing may be considered “unselling” or “marketing in reverse”, which includes general and selective demarketing.