A recent study published in the Journal of Retailing reveals that calorie labeling may confuse rather than clarify food health assessments. When participants evaluated healthier foods versus unhealthier options with calorie information in mind, they reported more moderate judgments, less confidence, and increased uncertainty compared to when they didnât consider calories. Across multiple experiments involving over 2,000 individuals, researchers observed a consistent pattern: calorie awareness led to metacognitive uncertainty. This challenges the widely held belief that calorie counts help consumers make healthier choices, suggesting that familiarity with calorie data may instead hinder accurate judges of food health.
Participants rated unhealthy food as less unhealthy and healthy food as less healthy when considering calorie information, resulting in more moderate judgments about food health.
Calorie labeling creates 'metacognitive uncertainty,' where individuals feel unsure about their evaluations of food health, thus leading to avoidance of extreme judgments.
The study highlights that while calorie information is familiar to the public, it doesn't enhance but rather undermines the accuracy of food health assessments.
Self-reported confidence in judging food health decreased when participants focused on calories, which led to more moderate evaluations of healthy and unhealthy foods.
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