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Background/Aims: Discretionary, energy‐dense, nutrient‐poor food and drinks are heavily marketed and readily available in retail settings frequented by adolescents. This study examines associations between food purchasing practices in various retail settings and dietary intake among Australian adolescents. Methods: Participants were students in years 8 to 11 (ages 12‐17 years) who completed the 2009‐10 (n = 13 790), 2012‐13 (n = 10 309) or 2018 (n = 9102) National Secondary Students' Diet and Activity (NaSSDA) cross‐sectional survey. Multistage stratified random sampling was used. An online survey completed at school assessed self‐reported frequency of food purchasing practices in various retail settings and consumption of discretionary food, sugary drinks, fruit and vegetables. Generalised linear regression models examined associations between food purchasing practices and dietary behaviour. Results: Relative to students who brought lunch from home, those who purchased lunch from school or nearby outlets reported higher intake of discretionary food and sugary drinks and lower fruit intake. Buying lunch from school was also associated with lower vegetable intake. Buying food or drinks on the school commute, outside school grounds during school hours, from supermarket checkouts, and using mobile phone apps were each associated with higher discretionary food and sugary drink intake (all P <.01). Conclusions: Purchasing food or drink in various retail settings is associated with higher intake of discretionary food and drink among Australian adolescents, and some purchasing practices appeared to displace fruit and vegetable intake. So What?: These findings highlight a need to improve the accessibility and promotion of healthier food and drink options in schools and other retail settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Smaller portion sizes are associated with lower energy intake. • We test a norm range model of the portion size effect on intended intake. • A wide range of portion sizes were perceived as normal. • Portions perceived as normal did not prompt intended compensatory eating. • Portions perceived as smaller than normal prompted intended compensation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because overconsumption of food contributes to ill health, understanding what affects how much people eat is of importance. The 'bogus' taste test is a measure widely used in eating behaviour research to identify factors that may have a causal effect on food intake. However, there has been no examination of the validity of the bogus taste test as a measure of food intake. We conducted a participant level analysis of 31 published laboratory studies that used the taste test to measure food intake. We assessed whether the taste test was sensitive to experimental manipulations hypothesized to increase or decrease food intake. We examined construct validity by testing whether participant sex, hunger and liking of taste test food were associated with the amount of food consumed in the taste test. In addition, we also examined whether BMI (body mass index), trait measures of dietary restraint and over-eating in response to palatable food cues were associated with food consumption. Results indicated that the taste test was sensitive to experimental manipulations hypothesized to increase or decrease food intake. Factors that were reliably associated with increased consumption during the taste test were being male, have a higher baseline hunger, liking of the taste test food and a greater tendency to overeat in response to palatable food cues, whereas trait dietary restraint and BMI were not. These results indicate that the bogus taste test is likely to be a valid measure of food intake and can be used to identify factors that have a causal effect on food intake. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current study sought to test the effect of a brief evaluative conditioning intervention on experienced temptation to indulge, and consumption of, unhealthy snack foods. We expected that a training task associating unhealthy food with negative affect would result in lower experienced temptation across the sample, but would lead to lower snack consumption only among individuals with low state inhibitory control. Undergraduate women ( N = 134) aged 17–25 years were randomised to complete an evaluative conditioning procedure pairing unhealthy food with either positive or negative affect. Snack consumption was subsequently assessed using a taste-test procedure which offered four snack foods for ad libitum consumption. Participants also reported the strength of their experienced temptation to indulge in the foods presented. Additionally, they completed a Stop Signal Task as a measure of state inhibitory control. As predicted, participants in the food negative condition ate less than those in the food positive condition, but this effect was only observed among individuals with low inhibitory control. The same moderation pattern was observed for the effect of evaluative conditioning on temptation: only participants with low inhibitory control reported feeling less tempted by the snack foods in the food negative condition compared to the food positive condition. In addition, temptation mediated the effect of evaluative conditioning on intake for individuals with low inhibitory control. Findings suggest that evaluative conditioning of unhealthy food stimuli could be especially useful for reducing temptation and consumption of unhealthy snacks in situations where individuals experience low inhibitory control capacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current study used a modified implicit association test (IAT) to change implicit evaluations of unhealthy snack food and tested its effects on subsequent consumption. Furthermore, we investigated whether these effects were moderated by inhibitory self-control. A sample of 148 women (17–25 years) motivated to manage weight through healthy eating completed an IAT intervention, and pre- and post-intervention IATs assessing implicit evaluations of unhealthy food. The intervention IAT trained participants to pair unhealthy food stimuli with either positive or negative stimuli. A task disguised as a taste-test was used to assess consumption of unhealthy snack foods. Inhibitory self-control was measured using a self-report scale. As predicted, the implicit evaluation of unhealthy food became more negative from pre- to post-training among participants in the food negative pairing condition; however, there was no corresponding change in the food positive pairing condition. The effect of the training on snack consumption was moderated by inhibitory self-control with only participants low in inhibitory self-control having lower snack intake following the food negative training. This finding is consistent with dual-process models of behaviour which predict that self-control capacity renders impulses less influential on behaviour. Furthermore, it suggests that an intervention that retrains implicit food evaluations could be effective at reducing unhealthy eating, particularly among those with low inhibitory self-control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

External influences on eating behaviour, such as portion size, have been reliably shown to influence food intake in the laboratory. However, little research has examined whether laboratory settings under or overestimate the effect that external influences have on food intake compared to when studied in the real-world. In Study 1, 60 participants (mean age = 32 years) were randomized to consume a large (200 g) or small (100 g) portion of popcorn under controlled laboratory conditions and during a separate session in their home. Results showed that the effect of portion size on food intake was larger at home (d = 0.97) than in the laboratory (d = 0.56). Furthermore, participants reported feeling more relaxed eating at home compared to the laboratory. In Study 2, we examined whether comparable results were observed in a semi-naturalistic laboratory designed to resemble a home setting. 59 participants (mean age = 28 years) completed the same procedure as Study 1 in a standard and a semi-naturalistic laboratory setting. Although participants reported having higher levels of private self-awareness in the standard laboratory, the effect that portion size had on food intake did not differ between the standard laboratory (d = 0.50) and the semi-naturalistic laboratory (d = 0.49). The impact that external influences on eating, such as portion size, have on food intake in the real-world may be underestimated when studied under laboratory conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research conducted in controlled laboratory settings plays an important role in understanding human eating behaviour. However, participant characteristics may affect motivation to participate in laboratory eating behaviour research and result in self-selection biases. First-year psychology students (n = 207, 90.8% female, m age = 18.8, m BMI = 21.9) were led to believe that they were choosing between enrolling in one of two laboratory-based studies: an 'advertising' study, or an 'advertising and food' study; the latter specified that participants would consume food and answer questions about their eating behaviour. Participants subsequently reported demographic information and completed a series of questionnaires assessing psychological characteristics hypothesised to predict self-selection in laboratory eating studies. The majority of participants preferred to participate in a study unrelated to eating over an eating-related study (70.5%, χ2 (1) = 34.90, p < .001). Participants choosing the eating-related study over the non-eating study had higher self-reported external eating tendencies and positive preoccupations with food, lower negative preoccupations with food and social appearance anxiety. Participants choosing the eating related study were also more likely to be male than female, although the number of males in the study was small (n = 19) and this finding should therefore be interpreted with caution. The present study provides some evidence that in university based samples of participants there are likely self-selection biases in laboratory-based eating behaviour studies and researchers may benefit from considering the potential influence of self-selection biases when conducting eating behaviour research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Demand characteristics are thought to undermine the validity of psychological research, but the extent to which participant awareness of study hypotheses affects laboratory-measured eating behaviour studies has received limited attention. Participants (N = 84) attended two laboratory sessions in which food intake was measured. In session 1 baseline food intake was measured. In session 2 participants were allocated to either a 'hypothesis aware' or 'hypothesis unaware' condition. Participants were led to believe in the 'hypothesis aware' condition that they were expected to increase their food intake in session 2 relative to session 1. Participants in the 'hypothesis unaware' condition were not provided with hypothesis information. Contrary to our pre-registered predictions, the experimental manipulation of hypothesis awareness did not affect session 2 food intake. However, the manipulation was less effective than anticipated as some participants did not appear to believe the hypothesis information provided. Post-hoc exploratory analyses revealed that participants who believed the study hypothesis was that their food intake would increase in session 2 ate more in session 2 than participants who did not believe this was the study hypothesis. Further confirmatory research is required to understand the causal effect that participant awareness of study hypotheses has on laboratory measured eating behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]