Warning: The Surgeon General May Be Bad For Your Health
Overview | Article Summary
| For Instructors | For
Students
Bushman, B.J. (1998). Effects of warning and information labels on consumption
of full-fat, reduced-fat, and no-fat products. Journal of Applied Psychology,
83, 97-101.
Overview:
Forbidden Fruit
Why do we do things that we know are bad for us? Why do we long to stick
our hands in the cookie jar when we have been told to stay out of it? This
phenomenon is even described in the Bible in the story of Adam and Eve
and the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden. Social psychologists are
very interested in understanding why people engage in behavior that they
know is "bad" for them.
Reactance theory attempts to account for why people want what
they shouldn't have. According to reactance theory, people perceive being
warned against something as a threat to freedom of behavior. This causes
a psychological reactance - the person strongly desires to retain freedom
of behavior. In order to retain a sense of freedom of behavior the person
engages in the warned behavior. So, being told that smoking, drinking,
or overeating is hazardous to our health has the opposite effect from what
is desired - it causes us to want to smoke, drink, and eat more.
Does a warning from an authoritative figure cause greater reactance
than a simple warning? Bushman (1998) examined college students' preferences
for different types of cream cheese based on a warning label from an authoritative
source, an information warning label, and no label.
Overview | Article Summary | For
Instructors | For Students
Article Summary
We are bombarded with warning labels every day, on cigarettes, alcohol,
food packages, television, the Web. These warning labels are meant to protect
us as consumers. However, warning labels seem to have the opposite effect
- they draw us toward the product rather than repel us from it.
Bushman (1998) hypothesized that simple information labels may be more
effective repellents than authoritative warning labels. He designed an
experiment in which college students rated their preference for and engaged
in taste tests of non-fat, reduced-fat, and full-fat cream cheeses. Students
rated their preferences and tasted the cream cheese under one of three
conditions:
-
Warning label. The cream cheeses were labeled with "In this product,
90% (or 64% or 0% depending on the actual fat content) of the calories
come from fat. Warning: The U. S. Surgeon General has determined that eating
high fat food increases your risk of heart disease."
-
Information label. The cream cheese were labeled with "In this product,
90% (or 64% or 0% depending on the actual fat content) of the calories
come from fat."
-
No label control.
Bushman found that students in the warning label and no label conditions
wanted to taste the high fat cream cheese more than students in the information
label condition. Interestingly, however, when allowed to chose one cheese
to taste, students in the warning and information label conditions were
less likely to actually taste the high fat cream cheese than students in
the no label condition.
Bushman's results support reactance theory; students reading the Surgeon
General warning labels wanted to taste the cream cheese more than students
who simply read the fat content information labels. Bushman argues that
information labels may be more effective than warning labels: Although
we may want to know what we are eating, we don't want some authority figure
telling us not to eat it.
Overview | Article Summary
| For Instructors | For Students
For Instructors
Links to the Lecture
At this point in the course, students tend to get lost in the details of
contrived laboratory experiments and lose sight of how psychology can inform
us about everyday behavior. This article can be used as a lead-in to a
discussion of how psychological theory and methods are applied to understanding
everyday human behavior. Bring up examples of local psychologists working
in applied settings, such as consumer protection agencies, personnel departments,
and local industry.
Overview | Article Summary
| For Instructors | For Students
For Students
About the Author
Brad
Bushman is a social psychologist at Iowa State University. He has found
similar effects using television
warnings: The stronger the warning, the more people want to watch the
show.
About the Journal
The Journal of Applied
Psychology publishes empirical articles that deal with applied
issues, such as consumer affairs, work performance and satisfaction, and
community affairs.
Links to Life
An English professor at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, Dr. Bethany
Dumas, has also found that people ignore warning labels. She has developed
guidelines for
writing warning labels.
-
Pay Attention to those Warnings!
Sometimes deadly serious warning labels are hilariously funny. Here is
a list of humorous - but true - warning
labels. Check out this site to read warning
labels designed by physicists.
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Reading About Food Giving You The Munchies?
Download this interactive
shareware, Munchies: How to eat well on a student budget, to
get the straight facts on nutrition. |
