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The health halo: how good PR is misleading shoppers
Research On The Health Halo Effect
- This effect often leads to consumers confusing “low fat” with “low calorie”, which results in the overconsumption of the former.
- When choosing between similar products with different names, consumers prefer products with healthier-sounding names.
- If you are eating at a restaurant you believe is healthy, you assume that the food choices you are making are healthy as well.
- People who think their meal is healthy are more likely to add side dishes, drinks and desserts, resulting in over twice as many additional calories.
- Items marketed by firms known as socially responsible stewards are assumed to be better and healthier products.
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Don’t Believe Healthy Labels
Don’t let your guard down when you see items labeled with healthy-sounding terms and don’t assume there is a correlation between things without proof. Know what you are eating by paying close attention to the nutritional information and, just as importantly, the recommended serving size.
The Health Halo Effect
Happens when we overestimate the healthfulness of an item based on a single claim, such as being low in calories or low in fat.
This halo effect makes us more comfortable to eat more than we otherwise would if a product is promoted as low in fat or calories.
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Mental Shortcuts
We don’t have complete control of our decision-making because we take mental shortcuts, using inbuilt biases which are supposed to improve the efficiency of our choices and actions.
We...
What Is a Health-Halo
It’s when people overestimate the healthiness of a food item because of unwarranted correlations. Research indicates that this effect causes people to consume larger portions and may even be a cause of obesity.
Subway Vs. Mcdonalds
A study comparing the two restaurants found that those who ate at Subway underestimated the calories in their meals more than those who ate at McDonald's.
Because Subway sandwiches are considered healthier, people are more likely to add a cookie and a soda. While people who eat at McDonald's are not under the health-halo so they’re less likely to order sides with a Big Mac.
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The origins of the breakfast myth
Much of the research suggesting that breakfast is essential for health is funded by cereal makers.
Companies like Kellogg, Quaker Oats and others whose businesses depend on p...
Breakfast and weight loss/gain
There’s no clear evidence that breakfast consumption promotes weight loss or that skipping breakfast leads to weight gain.
It might actually be a bad strategy for weight loss because eating breakfasts means taking in a higher number of calories/day.
The health halo of breakfast
...is not backed up by research.
It is possible for breakfast to have health benefits, especially for some groups (growing children and athletes), but there’s not a lot of good evidence behind those benefits.
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Decreasing The Health Halo Effect
It is difficult for consumers to differentiate and make healthy choices between products when there is a wide variation in serving sizes and nutritional values. So, increasing the amount of info...
Research On ‘Health Halos’
Protein bars are perceived as having an increased protein content and as healthier overall when the label reads “protein bar“ and “good source of protein. ”
The ‘Health Halo’ Effect
A ‘health halo’ occurs when a single health buzzword or claim causes a consumer to have other unsubstantiated positive impressions of the product.
Health halos in food advertising take the form of short messages on food packaging about the health benefits of an item. Product labels containing the words ‘low fat’, ‘organic’ and ‘gluten-free’ are perceived as healthy choices and influence consumer purchasing behaviors.
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