Slim by Design: Serving Healthy Foods First in Buffet Lines Improves Overall Meal Selection

Brian Wansink and Andrew S Hanks

PLOS ONE, 2013, vol. 8, issue 10, 1-5

Abstract: Objective: Each day, tens of millions of restaurant goers, conference attendees, college students, military personnel, and school children serve themselves at buffets – many being all-you-can-eat buffets. Knowing how the food order at a buffet triggers what a person selects could be useful in guiding diners to make healthier selections. Method: The breakfast food selections of 124 health conference attendees were tallied at two separate seven-item buffet lines (which included cheesy eggs, potatoes, bacon, cinnamon rolls, low-fat granola, low-fat yogurt, and fruit). The food order between the two lines was reversed (least healthy to most healthy, and vise-versa). Participants were randomly assigned to choose their meal from one line or the other, and researchers recorded what participants selected. Results: With buffet foods, the first ones seen are the ones most selected. Over 75% of diners selected the first food they saw, and the first three foods a person encountered in the buffet comprised 66% of all the foods they took. Serving the less healthy foods first led diners to take 31% more total food items (p

Date: 2013
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:plo:pone00:0077055

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0077055

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