The present paper presents a certain number of cultural elements which interact in the determination of the frequency of food intake. Approaches from various perspectives (historical, ethnological, anthropological, sociological) draw attention to two major aspects relating to the periodicity of food intake: the extreme cultural diversity and the continual mdications which have occurred over time and space. The various cultural models change and are subject to multiple influences, for example, cross-cultural, economic and historical. In addition, there are interactions between the models. The definitions of food intake and frequency play a major role in building up consumers' perceptions. These various perceptions are multiple (perception of self, of food and its virtues, the rules and moral values of consumption) and finally influence behaviours. Finally, and taking into account the systems of beliefs, the very nature of feeding behaviours may carry feelings of guilt for the subject. The study of real behaviours and their relationship with health is still incomplete for reasons of methodology and also of conceptual definition. In future, data collection has to take into account real behaviour as well as subjective perceptions and value judgements. A specific effort has to be made in the future to develop methodology. This should allow the collection of reliable data and particularly comparisons between studies, without oversimplifying and distorting cultural specificities.
Meal frequency: Eating behaviourHuman eating behaviour depends on both biological and cultural aspects. However, usual practices relating to the nature and range of food variety, ways of preparing food, the norms of consumption and social conventions of the time or quantity of meals, are all critically dependent on cultural aspects, except, perhaps, the amount of total energy intake. In this area, one can say, with reasonable certainty, that acquired knowledge is always more important than inborn knowledge.Historical (Flandrin & Montanari, 1996), ethnological (de Garine, 1979de Garine & Harrison, 1985), anthropological (Farb & Armelagos, 1980) and sociological (Fischler, 1990) research studies focus attention on two issues: the extreme diversity of eating habits from one culture to another and the constant transformation over time within a given culture. These changes involve, for example, eating behaviour as well as eating frequency.Chronobiology cannot satisfactorily establish the time determinism of meal frequency. Time as well as frequency of eating are far more dependent on social and cultural factors and upon perceptual constructs about food itself than upon strictly physiological aspects. Thus, the construction of perception of food, which cannot be dissociated from the eater's self-identity (Chiva, 1996), is not merely a cognitive process. Diverse cognitive and affective learning, hedonic factors and value judgements from different models interact.Finally, two other questions arise in this context: (a) the first relates to definitions...
