The moderating role of regulatory focus on the social modeling of food intake

Regulatory focus in economic contexts

“…Following this reasoning, we recently found in two experiments that inducing different self-regulatory orientations led to different responses to external social cues (Florack, Palcu, & Friese M., 2013). More precisely, in one study, we provided participants with tasty food and told them that they were allowed to consume as much food as they liked.…”

“She got more than me”. Social comparison and the social context of eating

“…Likewise, our state of mind may determine the extent to which we compare our own intake to the eating behavior of others. Florak, Palcu, and Friese (2013) showed that inducing a preventive regulatory focus (as opposed to a promotion focus) increased the degree to which participants matched the eating intake of others.…”

Regulatory focus and self-determination motives interact to predict students’ nutrition-habit intentions.

“…Promotion-related emotions (i.e., cheerfulness and dejection) similarly refer to an intrapersonal rather than interpersonal (or external) perspective (Higgins, Shah, & Friedman, 1997). In direct relation with health, individuals in a promotion focus were also found to rely more on internal cues (e.g., satiation) to regulate their eating behaviour (Florack et al, 2013). As such, one could expect a fit when the person holds strong intrinsic motives and the intervention or message adopts a promotion, rather than prevention, framing.…”