Cool veggie names leave preschoolers wanting for more
March 3rd, 2009 - 4:27 pm ICT by ANI ( Leave a comment )Washington, March 3 (ANI): Having trouble making your preschooler finish his veggies? Well, trying naming peas Power Peas and see the magic unfold.
According to a new study, labelling vegetables with catchy names, such as X-Ray Vision Carrots and Tomato Bursts, leave preschoolers wanting for more.
As per lead author Brian Wansink, writer of “Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Eat More Than We Think”, tots ended up eating more vegetables once a little fun was added to the names.
The Cornell University research examined 186 four-year olds, who were provided with carrots titled “X-ray Vision Carrots”, and found that they ate almost twice as much as on the lunch days that carried simply titled carrots.
The Robert Wood Johnson-funded study further discovered that kids continued to have around 50 per cent more carrots even on the days when they were no longer titled.
Wansink said: “Cool names can make for cool foods. Whether it be ”power peas” or ”dinosaur broccoli trees,” giving a food a fun name makes kids think it will be more fun to eat. And it seems to keep working even the next day.
Boffins believed similar results could be repeated with kids, with researcher Collin Payne saying: “I”ve been using this with my kids. Whatever sparks their imagination seems to spark their appetite.”
The new findings were presented at the annual meeting of the School Nutrition Association in Washington DC. (ANI)
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Tags: annual meeting, appetite, brian wansink, broccoli, carrots, catchy names, cool names, cornell university, dinosaur, four year olds, imagination, mindless eating, nutrition association, preschooler, ray vision, researcher, school nutrition, vegetables, veggies, x ray