Cloud-Based Commensality: Enjoy the Company of Co-diners Without Social Facilitation of Eating.

Chujun Wang,Linbo Qiu,Yubin Peng,Xiaoang Wan

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.758966

Abstract

Previous research has associated frequently enforced solo dining with negative consequences on psychological well-being, but the problem of having to eat alone may be solved by seeking mealtime companions in the digital space by watching an eating broadcast (i.e., Mukbang) or videoconferencing with others (i.e., cloud-based commensality). We conducted the present study to compare the consequences of Mukbang-based, cloud-based, and in-person commensality. Ninety-five healthy Chinese young adults were instructed to rate images of eating scenarios and foods. The results revealed that they expected loneliness to be reduced by Mukbang-based or in-person commensality, but they were also aware of the risks of enhancing food intake and/or being shifted toward less healthy food choices in these two scenarios. By contrast, the participants expected cloud-based commensality to provide the benefits of reducing loneliness without the health-compromising risks of increasing food intake or unhealthy eating. Collectively, these findings suggest the beliefs of the participants that cloud-based commensality can provide an “alone but together” context to balance the need for social interactions with the strategic avoidance of a social context facilitating unhealthy eating. The findings also provide some novel insights into how the application of technologies for eating behavior can be used to integrate social factors and food pleasure, and shed light on the promising future of cloud-based commensality as a combination of the strengths of solitary and commensal eating.

Highlights

As social creatures, we spend approximately 80% of our waking hours with the company of others (Kahneman et al, 2004) and often find hedonic activities more enjoyable when engaging with others (Ragunathan and Corfman, 2006), such as eating together
Eating together has been identified as such a context featured with social facilitation of eating, as it makes people eat more than usual (Cruwys et al, 2015) and provides an opportunity to overindulge (Herman, 2017) and can make eating unhealthy foods even more pleasant (Huang et al, under review)
It is possible that people may concentrate more on the social interaction rather than the foods or eating while engaging in the cloud-based commensality, which is different from the food-focused context of self-reflection or remote norms where social facilitation can be observed in the absence of others (Feeney et al, 2011; Nakata and Kawai, 2017)

Summary

Introduction

We spend approximately 80% of our waking hours with the company of others (Kahneman et al, 2004) and often find hedonic activities more enjoyable when engaging with others (Ragunathan and Corfman, 2006), such as eating together (i.e., commensality). The prevalence of eating alone does make a person miss out on the social benefits of commensality, which may be associated with the increases in the feeling of unhappiness (Yiengprugsawan et al, 2015) or the decreases in diet quality (Chae et al, 2018), as well as foster loneliness and the perception of social isolation (Takeda and Melby, 2017). When the circumstances make it difficult or even impossible to eat with others, advances in technologies allow a solo diner to seek mealtime companions in the digital space, resulting in a new form of commensality between remote codiners (Grevet et al, 2012). When the circumstances make it difficult or even impossible to eat with others, advances in technologies allow a solo diner to seek mealtime companions in the digital space, resulting in a new form of commensality between remote codiners (Grevet et al, 2012). Spence et al (2019) used the term “digital commensality” to describe scenarios that enable a solo diner to have the feeling of eating with others via digital technologies, such as watching Mukbang or videoconferencing with other diners while eating alone in reality

Results

Discussion

Conclusion