Shepherd and Towler (2007) found significant differences between men and women in regards to their attitudes towards nutrition and various classes of food. This difference was most pronounced in evaluations of the harmfulness of fried food: although both men and women considered fried foods harmful, women expressed far more negative attitudes about it. Differences in general evaluations of meat and dairy were non-significant.
Wardle et al (2004) found that half of the behavioral differences between men and women's dietary habits could be tied to their beliefs about their food choices. However, the Shephard and Towler study found disconnects for women between belief, intention, and behavior, especially around dairy products.
My relationship with food is complicated enough. I don't dare throw gender-politics into it (although I have noticed that I'm more self-conscious about just ordering a salad when I'm out!) My boyfriend, as I'm sure I've mentioned, seems to have some sort of biofuel engine that runs on deep-fryer oil. I love fried foods, but I don't feel great after consuming a lot of them. He seems to feel even better after a large meal of fried stuff with cheese. I have to wonder whether this is an adaptation to eating this kind of diet, or whether he actually has an easier time converting fried foods into energy and well-being.
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4 comments:
[info]lovecraftienne
2009-02-19 06:11 pm UTC
I think it's a bit disingenuous, if they've not taken into account the messages women are bombarded with from earliest days, about the importance of thinness and the evilness of being fat. That difference in socialization would have a huge impact on the perception of foods which are perceived to lead to fatness, like, say, things fried in "fat". That we use the same word for undesirable people and for food that might tend to lead one to join those undesirables shouldn't be ignored: if you tell a person their entire life that being "fat" is bad, then how are they going to react to food which is ostentatiously drenched in the stuff?
differenceblog.com
2009-02-19 06:21 pm UTC
I'm not sure it's useful to talk about separating the socialized messages from the "beliefs about foods". I don't think average-consumer is really doing research about it: where would they get their beliefs from?
astrogeek01
2009-02-19 08:15 pm UTC
What were the differences around dairy products?
differenceblog.com
2009-02-19 08:31 pm UTC
Shephard and Towler's Table 5 seems to indicate a non-significant difference between men and women on the "belief-evaluation" aspect of the Dairy category. The various axes for foods were: belief-evaluations, attitude, intentions, behavior.
The belief-evaluation aspect (for dairy) was based on these belief items: healthy, fat, taste, protein, vitamins, calories. (the lists were different for each food category).
Quoting from page 167:
"In general females had a more negative predisposition towards consuming meat, meat products, dairy, and fried foods than did males, and they had a correspondingly higher knowledge. In many of the analyses these differences were significant. In the dairy products section, females had significantly more positive sum of belief-evaluations, despite having more negative intentions and behaviour. This shows some inconsistency between the belief-evaluations, attitude, intentions and behaviour for this particular type of food. This might be because the food category is too wide and there may be some confusion in the person's mind as to the type of food concerned."
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