- Click here for explanation of classification scheme.

This paper describes two studies. The research purposes stated for each study are as follows.

• Study One: To delineate a portrait of people who are attracted to magical beliefs about food (MFH = Magical Food & Health beliefs)
• Study Two: To investigate the self-reported functions for the food beliefs.

• Finnish men and women
• Students or employees affiliated with several universities and vocational schools in Finland.

• Students with missing data on questionnaires in Study One
• No other exclusion criteria were specified for either study.

Recruitment

Study One

• Procedure
  • Participants were recruited through six universities and 10 vocational schools in Finland
  • Recruitment message sent via e-mail to students on a student e-mail list
    • 54 e-mail lists were used
    • 16,000 subscribed members.
  • When e-mail lists were unavailable, a school employee posted the recruitment information on a communication board (either real or virtual): Potential of 4,000 students at these institutions
  • Oral recruitment announcement concerning the study prior to a lecture: 280 students.
• Information provided to participants
  • Participants were told that the study concerned beliefs, personality and cognition
  • Participants were provided with contact information and names of researchers
  • Confidentiality and voluntary nature of study was stressed
  • By taking part in the study, participants were told they had a chance to win a prize
  • Participants were promised feedback on their responses approximately two months after their participation
    • Required that participant reveal a pseudonym, but not their identity
    • Feedback consisted of:
      • A general description of the phenomena studied
      • Absolute scale ranges and means
      • Participant's own score on each scale.
• Respondents were given between one and three weeks to participate in the study
• Researchers made efforts to:
  • Prudently choose their words
  • Stress that the results were based on the participant's self-description.

Study Two

• Procedure
  • Participants were recruited from psychology courses at the University of Helsinki and the Open University of Helsinki, Finland
  • Students selecting a vegetarian dish in a student restaurant at the University of Helsinki were asked to participate.
• Participants were told that:
  • The study concerned personality and attitudes toward food and health
  • Participation was voluntary
  • All information would remain confidential.

Design

Cross-sectional study.

Blinding Used

All responses were stored in a relational database and all data transmissions were encrypted to ensure confidentiality.

Intervention

Study One

• Participants were asked to complete a web survey assessing the following:
  • Eating status
  • Magical beliefs about food
  • Attitude toward alternative medicine
  • Negative life events
  • Desirability of control
  • Intuitive thinking.

Study Two

• Participants were asked to complete the questionnaires used in Study 1 plus the following:
  • Eating disorder symptoms
  • Functions of MFH beliefs.

Statistical Analysis

Study One

• Correlations between variables
• Standard multiple regression analyses
• Statistical significance: P<0.05.

Study Two

• Correlations between variables
• Standard multiple regression analyses
• One-way within participants ANOVA followed by planned pair-wise comparisons
  • Epsilon-corrected test
  • Greenhouse-Geisser test.
• Statistical significance: P<0.05.

Timing of Measurements

Study One

Participants were given one to three weeks to complete a web survey assessing the following:

• Eating status
  
  • I am omnivorous
  • I avoid eating red meat
  • I eat only fish and vegetarian food
  • I am a vegetarian
  • I am a vegan.
    • Statements One and Two were categorized as omnivores
    • Statements Three, Four and Five were categorized as vegetarians.
• Magical beliefs about food
  
  • Assessed by the Magical Beliefs About Food and Health Scale
    • Scale includes 17 items on magical thinking: Most follow the law of similarity or contagion
    • Items on the scale include
      • General magical beliefs (with no specific reference to animal content)
      • Animal products as contaminants of food or personality
      • Filler items (five questions)
    • Rating
      • All statements rated on a five-point scale from strongly disagree ("1") to strongly agree ("5")
      • Total score calculated by averaging all items.
• Attitude toward alternative medicine
  • Participants indicated their belief in alternative medicine treatments on a six-point scale
    • "0" (I do not know the therapy)
    • "1" (I do not believe in the therapy at all)
    • "5" (I strongly believe in the efficacy of this therapy)
    • "0" was scored as "1"
    • Scores were averaged into a sum score.
  • 12 treatments were listed
    • Chiropractic treatments
    • Acupuncture
    • Homeopathy
    • Nature medicine (herbs)
    • Large doses of vitamins or micronutrients
    • Treatments of magnetic fields or Kirlian photography
    • Meditation and/or mental imagery
    • Stone therapy
    • Color therapy
    • Psychic healing
    • Macrobiotics
    • Living, unheated food .
• Negative life events
  • Participants were asked whether they had ever and how many times they had experienced these traumatic events:
    • Death of a close relative or friend
    • Serious illness of a close relative or friend
    • A life-threatening situation (e.g., an accident or fire)
    • Rape, incest, physical assault or robbery.
  • Participants were asked if they had recently experienced any of these acute crisis situations:
    • Menopause or mid-life crisis (in Finland this is commonly expressed as a crisis of 30- or 40-year olds)
    • Divorce
    • Infidelity
    • Children leaving home
    • Notice to quit or unemployment
    • Economical difficulties
    • Requalification or change of profession
    • Some other crisis.
  • Scores were added together to get the amount of negative life events.
• Desirability of control
  • Desirability of control scale was used to evaluate participants' motivation to control events in their lives
    
    • Includes 20 seven-point items
    • Rating scale from "1" (The statement doesn't apply to me at all) to "7" (The statement always applies to me)
    • Sample question is "I enjoy making my own decisions."
• Intuitive thinking
  • Assessed by the experientiality scale of the Rational-Experiential Inventory (REI-R)
    • 20 five-point items
    • Rating scale from "1" (Strongly disagree) to "5" (Strongly agree)
    • Sample question is "I believe in trusting my hunches."

Study Two

• Qustionnaires were the same as those described in Study One for:
  • Eating status
  • MFH beliefs
  • Desirability of control
  • Intuitive thinking
  • Negative life events.
• The Attitude Toward Alternative Medicine questionnaire contained slightly changed treatment offerings:
  • Chiropractic treatments
  • Naprapathic treatments
  • Acupuncture
  • Homeopathy
  • Natural vitamins or other natural cures
  • Large doses of vitamins
  • Treatments of magnetic fields or Kirlian photography
  • Primal therapy or Rosentherapy
  • Meditation
  • Stone or color therapy
  • Psychic healing or shamanism
  • Lifestyle diets.
• Additional questionnaires included:
  • Eating disorder symptoms
    • Assessed by 26-item abbreviated version of the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT)
    • Rating scale from "1" (never) to "6" (always)
    • Sample statement: "Find myself preoccupied with food"
  • Functions of MFH beliefs
    • Assessed with a Function Scale
      • Includes six functions, each presented below with a sample statement
        • Control ("These beliefs have clarified my view of the world")
        • Social identity ("It is important for me to belong to a group of people who think this way")
        • Value-expressive ("My beliefs reflect my personal values")
        • Self-esteem ("My beliefs give me a feeling that I am a good person")
        • Defensive ("My beliefs protect me from some anxiety")
        • Utilitarian ("I might avoid something negative by thinking like this").
      • Rating scale: "1" (does not reflect my opinions at all) to "5" (reflects my opinions very well)
      • Function scale was presented after the MFH scale was completed
      • Participants were told to fill in the scale if they at least partly agreed with any of the statements
      • Six MFH statements were repeated and evaluated separately:
        
        • Two items on general magical beliefs
        • Two items on animal products as food contaminants
        • Two items on animal products as personality contaminants.

Dependent Variables

MFH beliefs.

Independent Variables

• Age
• Gender
• Vegetarianism
• Alternative medicine
• Negative events
• Desire for control
• Intuitive thinking
• Desire for control and negative life events interaction variable
• Eating disorder symptoms (only in Study Two).

Control Variables

Controlled for statistically using multiple regression analysis of results.

Study One

• Initial N: 3,282 (74% female)
• Attrition (final N): 3261(21 participants excluded due to missing data)
• Age: 24±5.67 years (range 15 - 60 years)
• Ethnicity: Finnish
• Other relevant demographics
  
  • Educational status
    
    • 85% of all participants reported being full-time students
      • 77% were university students
      • 23% attended vocational school
    • Wide variety of disciplines reported
      
      • Social sciences
      • Natural sciences
      • Law
      • Medicine
      • Behavioral sciences
      • Technology
      • Agriculture
      • Arts
      • Humanities
      • Business
      • Service.
  • Occupational status: 9% of all participants were employed full-time.
• Anthropometrics: No specific information was provided on anthropometric measures
• Location: Finland.

Study Two

• Initial N: 189 (84% were female)
• Attrition (final N): 189
• Age: 26.74±8.88 years (range 18 - 66 years)
• Ethnicity: Finnish
• Other relevant demographics
  • Status
    • 75% were full-time students: 10 fields of study
    • 25% participants were employed.
      
• Anthropometrics: No specific information was provided on anthropometric measures
• Location: Finland.

 

Main Findings

• According to this study, the portrait of believers in magical food and health beliefs is:
  • Female rather than male
  • Vegetarian rather than omnivore
  • Relied more on alternative medicine
  • Thought in a more intuitive way
  • Demonstrated more eating-disordered thinking
  • Experienced slightly more negative life events (demonstrated in Study One).
• The most important function for MFH beliefs was the value-expressive function.

Study One

• MFH beliefs were associated with:
  • Female gender
  • Vegetarianism
  • Positive attitude toward alternative medicine
  • Negative life events
  • Intuitive thinking.
• All independent variables contributed significantly to the prediction of MFH beliefs [R²=0.33, F(7,3046)=217.75, P<0.001]
• There was no correlation between desire for control and MFH, but acted by suppressing irrelevant variance in the other independent variables
• Age was not correlated with beliefs.

Correlations Between Variables in Study One

Variable	MFH Beliefs	Gender	Vegetarianism	Alternative Medicine	Negative Life Events	Desire for Control
Gender	-0.17***
Vegetarianism	0.38***	-0.10***
Alternative Medicine	0.44***	-0.14***	0.10***
Negative Life Events	0.11***	0.00	0.02	0.14***
Desire for Control	-0.03	0.05**	0.05**	0.02
Intuitive Thinking	0.26***	-0.18***	0.07***	0.33***	0.11***	0.09***

**P<0.01
***P<0.001.

Multiple Regression Analysis for Variables Predicting MFH Beliefs in Study One

Variable	B	Beta	T
Gender	-0.08	-0.07	-4.27***
Vegetarianism	0.53	0.34	22.45***
Alternative Medicine	0.02	0.35	22.23***
Negative Events	0.02	0.07	4.77***
Desire for Control	-0.07	-0.07	-4.61***
Desire for control X Negative events	0.01	0.00	0.19
Intuition	0.10	0.11	6.61***

***P<0.001.

Study Two

• MFH beliefs correlated positively with
  • Vegetarianism
  • Positive attitude toward alternative medicine
  • Eating disorder symptoms
  • Intuitive thinking.
• The functions of MFH beliefs differed significantly from one another [F(3.846, 223.075)=34.18, P<0.001, η² = 0.371]
• Age was not correlated with MFH
• Rating of importance of the MFH functions:

1. Value-expressive (M=2.99; SD=0.13, P<0.02)
2. Control (M=2.72; SD=0.10, P<0.02)
3. Utilitarian (M=2.53; SD=0.09, P<0.02)
4. Self-esteem (M=2.34; SD=0.12, P<0.02)
5. Defensive (M=2.06; SD=0.10, P<0.02)
6. Social identity (M=1.94; SD=0.09, P<0.02).

Correlations Between the Variables in Study Two

Variable	MFH Beliefs	Gender	Vegetarianism	Alternative Medicine	Negative Life Events	Desire for Control	Eating Disorder Symptoms
Gender	-0.12
Vegetarianism	0.32***	-0.13
Alternative Medicine	0.39***	-0.02	0.08
Negative Life Events	0.13	0.04	0.07	0.19*
Desire for Control	0.10	0.08	-0.03	0.06	0.20**
Intuitive Thinking	0.21**	-0.19**	0.06	0.26***	0.18**	0.06
Eating Disorder Symptoms	0.24***	-0.11	-0.04	0.15	0.12	0.06	0.02

*P<0.05
**P<0.01
***P<0.001.

Multiple Regression Analysis for Variables Predicting MFH Beliefs in Study Two

Variable	B	Beta	T
Gender	0.02	0.01	0.15
Vegetarianism	0.50	0.36	5.36***
Alternative Medicine	0.07	0.34	4.87***
Negative Events	0.00	-0.01	-0.18
Desire for Control	-0.03	-0.03	-0.46
Desire for Control x Negative Events	0.01	0.02	0.23
Intuition	0.13	0.13	1.91+
Eating Disorder Symptoms	0.20	0.17	2.48*

+P<0.06
*P<0.05
***P<0.001.

Other Findings

• Age did not correlate with MFH
• MFH believers experienced slightly more negative life events (demonstrated in Study One)
• Believers and non-believers in MFH did not differ in desire for control
• The same variables that corrrelated with MFH beliefs also predicted them [R² =0.34, F(8,150)=9.18, P<0.001].

• Changing or preventing unfounded beliefs about food, dieting and health should take into account the emotional and value-related aspects of these issues, not simply providing scientific information
• Affective information on food and health may be especially effective for people who are most prone to MFH beliefs; i.e., women, vegetarians, people with a positive attitude toward alternative medicine and people with eating disorder symptoms.

Government:	Academy of Finland (grant #200828)
Not-for-profit	Foundation associated with industry: