Salad or fries? How the ‘healthy option’ can outwit us

Apr 30, 2009 12:41 PM

A friend of mine has taken to heart the campaign urging us to eat more fruit and vegetables. He hasn't changed his diet, which, without his girlfriend's prompting, would consist almost entirely of cheese. What he has done is come up with increasingly imaginative ways to cheat his way toward the target. A sprig of parsley on a steak? One portion of vegetables. Lime juice in a daiquiri? That's a portion of fruit. And wine is made out of grapes, so that must count, surely?

Given that two-thirds of Americans are classed as being overweight or obese, it's hardly surprising that fast-food companies have been trying to boost their health credentials by putting fruit and salads on their menus. However, while people like to see them there, these products don't always sell* by a professor of marketing and psychology at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, suggests that healthy options on a menu may have the same effect as lime in my friend's cocktail: helping people convince themselves that they're making healthy choices when they're doing the opposite.

Around 100 college students took part in the study. Some were given the choice of three identically priced side dishes: fries, chicken nuggets, or a baked potato. The rest were given the same menu, but with a side salad added as a further option. About 10 percent of the students chose fries if they were only offered the three less healthy options. But if a salad was added to the menu, 33 percent chose the fries. The researchers think that just by considering the salad, the college students convinced themselves that they were behaving in a healthy way. Feeling that bit more virtuous then allowed them to choose the least healthy thing on the menu.

What you need to know. Staying healthy means making healthy choices consistently. There's nothing wrong with fries every so often, but you'll need to balance them out with healthier foods over time. Watch out for occasions when you're led to make less healthy choices without meaning to.

—Philip Wilson, patient editor, BMJ Group

ConsumerReportsHealth.org has partnered with The BMJ Group to monitor the latest medical research and assess the evidence to help you decide which news you should use.

Read more on how to eat a healthful meal at a fast-food restaurant, and find out why kids who go to school near fast-food restaurants are more likely to be obese.