24 April 2025
New University of Hamburg study on nutritional decision-makingWhen hunger drives perception
Photo: Jennifer March
Have you ever walked through a supermarket, stomach grumbling, and tried to choose healthy food over tastier but less healthy options? Anyone faced with rows of colorful products knows this feeling. Researchers have now published a study in the journal eLife, laying out new insights into cognitive decision-making in food selection, using behavioral measures, eye-tracking, and computer-supported modeling.
“Although we have long known that hungry people will more often make unhealthy food choices, we wanted to better understand the underlying mechanisms behind this phenomenon,” explains Jennifer March, co-author and researcher in the Faculty of Psychology and Human Movement Science at the University of Hamburg.
Experiment and controlled conditions
Working with Prof. Dr. Sebastian Gluth, head of the cognitive modeling and decision-making neurosciences working group, March leads the study examining 70 adults from Hamburg and the surrounding area. Every test subject went through 2 rounds of testing, once when hungry and once after having eaten. During the test, they were asked to choose between two food options, one healthy, but less tasty, and one unhealthy, but tastier option. Both options were marked with the Nutri-Score, a common nutrition ratings label.
Eye-tracking was used to note which information the test subjects paid particular attention to in making their choice. The evaluation was conducted using a computer-supported assessment model, known as a multi-attribute attentional drift diffusion model.
Hunger changes what we pay attention to, and how we make choices
The result: even in a normal state of satiety, most test subjects preferred appealingly presented food. This effect was much stronger when they were hungry. Their attention wandered more to the visual and tastier-looking options, while nutritional information like the Nutri-Score was considered less. They also spent less time choosing when they were hungry.
“Our data shows that hunger changes how we weigh information in making choices. Flavor becomes more important, and health considerations take a back seat,” summarized March.
Public health implications
The results show that simple measures such as nutritional labels alone are not enough to promote healthy food choices, particularly not for hungry people. Future measures seeking to encourage healthy choices should therefore aim particularly at drawing attention to the health aspects, such as through visual highlighting, or intelligent placement in supermarkets and canteens.
“Hunger doesn’t just change our behavior, it also changes how our brains process information,” emphasized Gluth. “Anyone looking to promote healthy choices should consider more carefully how decisions are made under real conditions, including being hungry.”
Original publication:
March, Jennifer, Gluth Sebastian (2025): The Hungry Lens: Hunger Shifts Attention and Attribute Weighting in Dietary Choice. DOI: https://elifesciences.org/reviewed-preprints/103736#s2
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