Obesity Can be a Socially Transmitted Disease: Social Norms Influence Food Choices

Can obesity be a socially transmitted disease? In some cases, it might be. Scientists have found that social norms influence food choices. This, in turn, can influence whether or not a person tends toward obesity or not.

In order to see how eating habits could be impacted by social norms, the scientists examined 15 studies from 11 publications. Eight of these studies examined how information about food intake norms influenced food consumed by participants. Seven other studies looked at how the effects of food choice normally influenced how people decided what food to eat.

So what did they find? It turns out that there was consistent evidence that social normal influence food consumption.  For example, if participants were informed that others were making low-calorie or high-calorie food choices, it significantly increased the likelihood that the participants made similar choices. Not only that, but finding out that others were eating large portions made the participants also increase food intake.

"It appears that in some contexts, conforming to informational eating norms may be a way of reinforcing identity to a social group, which is in line with the social identity theory," said Eric Robinson, one of the researchers, in a news release. "By this social identity account, if a person's sense of self is strongly guided by their identity as a member of their local community and that community is perceived to heat healthily, then that person would be hypothesized to eat healthily in order to maintain a consistent sense of social identity."

The findings reveal a bit more about how our social group can influence our food choices. In fact, the social mechanisms that influence what we decide to eat are present even when we eat along or are at work, whether or not we're aware of it.

"The evidence reviewed here is consistent with the idea that eating behaviors can be transmitted socially," said Robinson in a news release. "Taking these points into consideration, the findings of the present review may have implications for the development of more effective public health campaigns to promote 'healthy eating.' Policies or messages that normalize healthy eating habits or reduce the prevalence of beliefs that lots of people eat unhealthily may have beneficial effects on public health."

The findings are published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.