Measuring Implicit Approach-Avoidance Tendencies towards Food Using a Mobile Phone outside the Lab.

Anne-Marie Brouwer,Ivo V Stuldreher,Jasper J Van Beers,Priya Sabu,Daisuke Kaneko,Hilmar G Zech

doi:10.3390/foods10071440

Abstract

Implicit (‘unconscious’) approach–avoidance tendencies towards stimuli can be measured using the Approach Avoidance Task (AAT). We recently expanded a toolbox for analyzing the raw data of a novel, mobile version of the AAT (mAAT), that asks participants to move their phone towards their face (pull) or away (push) in response to images presented on the phone. We here tested the mAAT reaction time and the mAAT distance in a study with 71 Dutch participants that were recruited online and performed an experiment without coming to the laboratory. The participants used both the mAAT and (explicit) rating scales to respond to photographic images of food. As hypothesized, the rated wanting, rated valence and mAAT reaction time indicated a preference for palatable over unpalatable food, and for Dutch over Asian food. Additionally, as expected, arousal was rated higher for unpalatable than for palatable food, and higher for Dutch than for Asian food. The mAAT distance indicated that the unpalatable food images were moved across larger distances, regardless of the movement direction (pull or push), compared to the palatable food images; and the Dutch food images were moved across larger distances than the Asian food images. We conclude that the mAAT can be used to implicitly probe approach–avoidance motivation for complex images in the food domain. The new measure of mAAT distance may be used as an implicit measure of arousal. The ratings and the mAAT measures do not reflect the exact same information and may complement each other. Implicit measures, such as mAAT variables, are particularly valuable when response biases that can occur when using explicit ratings are expected.

Highlights

Emotional attitudes towards food are considered to be important in predicting consumer behavior [1,2,3,4,5]
After finishing the mobile version of the AAT (mAAT), participants were directed to their computer to watch a movie as a break
The valence and wanting indicated a preference for palatable8 oovf e1r3 unpalatable, and a preference for Dutch over Asian food

Summary

Introduction

Emotional attitudes towards food are considered to be important in predicting consumer behavior [1,2,3,4,5]. It has been shown that, compared to verbal liking preferences, food-evoked emotions have more predictive value in foreseeing whether consumers will like a product or not [1]. Implicit and explicit measures of food-evoked emotions can convey similar information. Skin conductance has consistently been found to be positively associated with arousal [9,10,11,12], and is influenced by factors unrelated to emotion, such as temperature, whereas explicit reports on arousal reflect ‘arousal’ as interpreted by the individual, to the extent that he or she is aware of this and chooses to share this information. A difference between explicit and implicit measures, and the added value of implicit measures, is, e.g., expected in cases of social pressure for a certain explicit response, or when explicit responses are affected by cultural bias [13,14,15]

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Results

Conclusion