False memories of food can change what people want to eat.

Elizabeth Loftus (in collaboration with Dan Bernstein, Cara Laney & Erin Morris).

We report on several experiments in which we convinced people that as children they had had certain experiences with foods. In studies in which we led people to believe that they had become ill after eating either hard-boiled eggs or dill pickles, “believers” later showed avoidance of the relevant food item. Would this work with fattening foods? The answer is: depends. Planted false memories of getting sick on strawberry icecream led to avoidance, but avoidance did not occur for potato chips, possibly indicating that the process works best when the food item is somewhat novel. In other studies we planted a false memory of a positive experience with a healthy food (asparagus), and people later showed increased inclination to eat that food. These results suggest that false memories do have consequences for people, affecting their later thoughts and behaviors. Moreover, the findings add a new twist to an existing literature on nutritional selection. Might they possibly become the basis for a new dieting technique?