New Nutrition Guidelines

The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently replaced its food pyramid nutrition guidelines with a user-friendly plate icon to help Americans understand the proportions of foods they should be eating each day for a healthy diet.

In this edition of Smith Business Close-Up with the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business, Dr. Rebecca Ratner talks about how her research supports the new nutrition guidelines.

Ratner, associate professor of marketing, and a colleague from Harvard studied how consumers used the old pyramid and compared that with the idea of filling half of your plate with fruits and vegetables. Their findings showed the half-plate concept to be easier to understand and remember. Ratner is a social psychologist and her research explores consumer psychology and consumer decision making. Her research has appeared in the top marketing, psychology and decision-making academic journals.