title: Nutrient-centrism and perceived risk of chronic disease.
abstract: This experiment explored consequences of two common lay theories about the diet-disease link: nutrient-centrism, the belief that nutrients (e.g. potassium) are crucial to staving off disease, and whole-food centrism, the belief that whole foods (e.g. bananas), containing these nutrients in their natural context, are most beneficial. Depicting an individual's diet in terms of nutrients rather than whole foods containing these nutrients reduced the perceived likelihood that the individual would experience leading diet-related diseases (e.g. heart disease, diabetes). Although nutrition experts increasingly emphasize the health benefits of natural whole foods, people nevertheless appear to privilege nutrients when estimating disease risks.
authors.affiliation: Cornell University, USA jps56@cornell.edu.
authors.forename: Jonathon P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Schuldt
authors.affiliation: Pomona College, USA.
authors.forename: Adam R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Pearson
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D002908:Chronic Disease / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005502:Food; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D012306:Risk; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: disease risk; heuristics and biases; nutrients; nutritionism; reductionism; risk perception