Page 195 - How to Be a Conscious Eater - Making Food Choices That Are Good for You

Health halos: A “health halo” is a psychological phenomenon in
which we perceive a product overall as being healthier and
lower in calories when it has one or more labels indicating
that something we perceive as bad has been removed—
classic examples are “low-fat” and “gluten-free.” In reality,
those products are typically about the same calorically and
the same or worse nutritionally (depending on the replace-
ment ingredients, which are often higher amounts of salt and
sugar). As a result, most of us will unwittingly eat more of prod-
ucts like these than we would have of the original product.
Product imagery can have a similar health halo effect.
Because most of us are naturally drawn to convenience and
novel food products that skew less healthy than their whole-
foods ancestors, much effort goes into making foods that
aren’t too good for us seem good for us. Ever see the product
veggie sticks or veggie straws? It’s a classic health halo exam-
ple. On the front you’ll
see beautiful portraits
of spinach and tomatoes,
but the first ingredient is
actually potato flour. Then
farther down the list you’ll
see some spinach powder or
tomato powder. Tricksters! I
fell for this myself recently
with beet crackers. There
was a photo on the front of
a racy red beet. Only once I
got home did I notice that
the first ingredient was
actually potato flour. Sure,
“beet powder” was sec-
ond on the list, but it

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