Why Do People Eat the Same Breakfast Every Day? Diversity Goals and Circadian Rhythms in the Diet

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.appet.2021.105716

Commentary

There is a circadian rhythm to what people eat, and while many people will happily eat the same foods every day for breakfast, they want more variety in the foods they eat for lunch and dinner.

This study identified psychological goals as the driving force behind this diurnal pattern of seeking variety, complementing other biological and cultural drivers.

People are more likely to pursue hedonic goals of eating as the day progresses, seeking more variety in dinner and lunch than in breakfast.

We find evidential support for this theory in French and American subjects. (N = 4481)

Variations in hedonic goal activation, both endogenous and exogenous, modulate the pursuit of dietary variety over several days.

Hedonic goal activation predicts meal-seeking diversity when controlling for factors such as time spent preparing and eating meals, the presence or absence of other people, and whether meals were eaten inside or outside the home.

Goal activation also explains differences in the amount of time spent eating, but the results show that increasing the amount of time spent eating does not increase diversity seeking.

As a consequence of these things, we observed that a similar increase in hedonic goal activation was shown to result in a substantial increase in diversity seeking at breakfast rather than at lunch rather than at dinner.