Eating Behaviour- Explanations for the success/failures of dieting

Question 1

Name the first explanation and elaborate on it.

Answer 1

1- Detail

• One explanation for why diets succeed may lie in the attention we pay to what is being eaten.
• People usually like experiences less as they repeat them. When it comes to dieting this makes it harder to stick to a particular regime.
• Instead of thinking ‘not another salad’ we should focus on the specifics of the meal, for example the flavours, colours and contents.
• By focusing on the specific details of each meal, people get bored less easily and so are able to maintain their diet. By paying attention to detail diets can succeed.

Question 2

AO2- Detail

Answer 2

I) There is evidence to support detail as an explanation for the success of dieting.
E) Redden (2008) gave participants 22 jelly beans each, one at a time, As each bean was dispensed, information about it was displayed on a computer screen.
• One group saw general information- ‘bean No.7’
• One group saw specific details about the bean’s flavour- ‘cherry flavoured bean No.7’
Redden found that participants got bored with eating jellybeans faster when they saw general information, whereas they enjoyed the task more if they saw specific details.
C) These findings support the validity of detail as an explanation for the success of dieting because the fact that participants got bored less easily when they knew specific details about the beans shows that people will not get bored with diets as easily if they know specific details about the food that they are eating.