Division of Social Sciences, Yale-NUS College, 16 College Avenue West, Singapore, 138527, Singapore.
Department of Psychology, National University of Singapore, 9 Arts Link, Singapore, 117572, Singapore.
Appetite. 2020 Nov 1;154:104787. doi: 10.1016/j.appet.2020.104787. Epub 2020 Jun 21.
Advances in cell phone technology have the potential to disrupt eating patterns. In this research, we focused on the camera function of a cell phone, characterizing: (i) the extent to which this function is used during meals; (ii) whether meal-time photographers show signs of pathological eating; and (iii) whether the act of taking food photographs alters the amount and enjoyment of food eaten. In the first study, we used the experience sampling method to track one week of meals from 137 young adults. Although we observed a low base rate of meal-time photography (5.44% of the 1140 meals captured), phone users who engaged in this practice had higher external eating scores than those who did not. That is, these meal-time photographers were more likely to eat in response to external cues (e.g. the sight of palatable food) than to internal cues of hunger. However, when participants were randomly assigned to take either food or non-food photographs within a lab setting (Study 2), we found no evidence that the type of photography influenced either the amount or enjoyment of food eaten. Taken together, our findings suggest a limited role for cell phone photography in an obesogenic environment.
手机技术的进步有可能扰乱人们的饮食习惯。在这项研究中，我们专注于手机的摄像功能，研究内容包括：（i）人们在就餐过程中使用手机摄像功能的程度；（ii）就餐时拍照的人是否存在进食障碍的迹象；（iii）拍摄食物照片的行为是否会改变所食用食物的数量和享受程度。在第一项研究中，我们采用经验抽样法，对 137 名年轻人的一周用餐情况进行了跟踪记录。尽管我们观察到就餐时拍照的发生率很低（在 1140 顿饭中，只有 5.44%的用餐被拍摄），但参与拍照的手机用户比不拍照的用户有更高的外食得分。也就是说，与饥饿等内部信号相比，这些就餐时拍照的人更倾向于对外界刺激（如美味食物的出现）做出反应。然而，当参与者在实验室环境中被随机分配拍摄食物或非食物照片时（研究 2），我们没有发现拍照类型会影响所食用食物的数量或享受程度。综合来看，我们的研究结果表明，手机拍照在致肥胖环境中作用有限。
