Is menu design effective? A p-curving analysis

Abstract

Menu design is important to restaurateurs. Past studies show that menu design can be effective in enhancing consumers’ attitudes, behavioral intentions, and purchases. In the present study the evidential level of the menu-design literature is evaluated using p-curve, a recently developed meta-analytical technique. Both the full and half p-curves are significantly right-skewed, suggesting that the reported effects of menu design are real. We test a few moderators where evidential values in some subsets of the literature may vary. Further analyses show that evidential values are high across studies with different sample sizes and years of publication, appearing in hospitality or foodservice journals, conducted in the US or outside, in the field or lab, and using mock or real menus. In general, the menu-design literature does not seem to be tainted by p-hacking, which refers to researchers’ exploitation of degrees of freedom in data collection and reporting to produce significant results.