FOOD HABITS

FOOD HABITS

Food habits are defined as ‘the way in which individuals in response to social and cultural pressures select, consume, and utilize portions of the available food supply’ (Khan & Hackler, 1981). Food habits develop from learned experience, which leads to the development of attitudes towards food. Food habits become a form of self-expression.

There are certain factors that affect the food habit. Such as physiological, psychological, social and economic factors. The physiological need of food is to satisfy the hunger, appetite, nutritional requirement and reaction to food. The psychological factors relate to the mind and emotions. These psychological needs are difficult to describe, and it depend on person’s life style and upbringing. Some psychological factors such as beliefs, values, habits and past experience with food have a constant influence on the food that you prefer to consume.  The economic factors that affect while selecting foods are cost of food, available resources, the market place and occupation and finances. The cost of foods also affects the choice of food. The food prices will affect some groups of the population. It also has been found that those in lower socio economic groups consume less fruits and vegetables than those in higher socio economic groups. In general life style has its influence on food such as employment, education, geographic location, travel an interests and household structures and roles (Kirk & Gillespie, 1990).

Food plays a very important role in people’s lives in most cultures. All the necessary requirement in making or preparation of food and the activities such as capture, cultivation, preparation and consumption are considered a vital part of a cultural act. It has been adopted gradually as per availability of prey and climate conditions (LEVITAS, 1988).So how the culture effects the food choices is important to study and it helps to understand the different aspects of food making, which greatly varies among different cultures across the globe. However, the degree of importance varies from culture to culture. For example, in American Samoa most family activities and ceremonies center on eating. A host family demonstrates its prosperity or social rank by providing large quantities of food. Sometimes the difference in eating habits create challenges for international food retail companies to cater to customers and market themselves. Conversely, the foods of mainstream culture have been influenced by the presence of ethnic cultures. Fast food restaurants and other takeout restaurants now offer such wide ranging selections as pizza, tacos, falafel, tandoori etc. For generations eating food is all family members getting together and spending some quality time but previously it was at home and now people have started to going out for dinners, in restaurants on special occasions and weekends.

When you grow up in a distinctive culture, it’s bound to influence your life style, your belief system and perhaps your diet. Some foods are consumed by people over long term through generations. Dietary habits are the habitual decisions an individual or culture makes when choosing what food to eat. This may be due to personal taste or ethical reasons.  These foods have traditional or historic precedent in a national, regional or local cuisines. For instance the traditional foods of the Eastern Mediterranean region include falafel, halwa, kanefeh etc. Nations or countries are frequently associated with certain foods. For example, many people associate Italy with pizza and pasta. Yet Italians eat many other foods and types of pasta dishes that vary through Italy.

Many cultures have recognizable cuisines. It is a specific set of cooking traditions that are used like various spices or a combination of flavors that is unique to the certain culture. Other difference of food includes preferences like hot, cold or spicy, etc. Some popular types of ethnic foods include Italian, French, Japanese, Chinese, American, Thai, Caju, African and Indian cuisine.

Food traditions or culture vary widely throughout the world. Even among the people who shares similar cultural backgrounds and same food habits. But their eating habits are not identical. People from different age group eat differently (Yap, Mahadeva & Goh, 2014).

Therefore, sensitivity of food rules and customs is important in building and strengthening cross cultural relationships.

Asian food and culture

In Asian food culture rice is consumed at a very high rate in all parts of Asia. Rice is mainly served either porridge, steamed or as even as rice noodles. The Chinese and other some cultures follow Buddhism, which prohibits them to consumption of huge amount of food at a time. The Chinese, Vietnamese, Japanese cultures all consume their food with chopsticks but with different shapes.

The Middle Eastern food

As Middle Eastern countries are most of Islamic religion. They exclude consumption of pork or alcohol in any form. The most common use is of olives and chickpeas in Middle Eastern cuisine and pita bread is very popular flat bread that is consumed there. Thus it signifies as how drastically culture affect the food choices.

So in order to jot down all the facts related to culture and food and understand the authentically of how does culture have effect on food choices that you made. It can be said that the transformation of recipes into real food that eventually acquires its own language and comes out as a product of complex culture that is affected by external factors such as climate, geography, the pursuit of pleasure and the wish to acquire good health. It can be easily concluded that food has always symbolized class and cultures.

 Food culture have long been incorporated into religious customs across the globe. For example only kosher foods are permitted by Judaism and halal foods by Islam. There are certain religious groups that practice abstinence or are restricted to consume certain foods and drinks during holy days, such as Ramadan for Muslims. While there are other religious sects that incorporate food preparation processes with religious rituals. Some religious food practices and restrictions are attributed to early health concerns in food and drinking conception. Many Hindus for example, abide with a strict vegetarian foods. On the other hand, Hindus who eat meat are restricted from consuming beef because cows are considered sacred in Hinduism. Islam is also common religion in India and it prohibits the use of pork in any kind of food. Religious food vary extensively. The prohibition and restrictions involved within a particular religion may vary between branches or denominations. The ingredients, method of preparation, preservation techniques and types of food eaten at different meals vary among cultures.

Regional food habit do exist, but they also change over time. As people immigrate, food practices and preferences are imported and exported. Families move to other locations, bringing their food preferences with them. They may use their old recipe with new ingredients or experiment with new recipe to incorporate ingredients to match their own taste. In addition to impacting food choices culture plays a role in food related etiquette. People in western societies may refer to food related etiquette as table manners, a phrase that illustrate the cultural expectation of eating food or meal at a table. Some people eat with forks and spoons. There are also much more people who use fingers or chopsticks.

Individual dietary choices may be more or less healthy. Proper nutrition’s we need for our body in the form of carbohydrates, proteins and fats. Food is essentially considered to consist of nutrition’s that support body growth and metabolism to provide energy. Dietary habits and choices play a significant role in the quality of life, health and longevity. A healthy diet may improve or maintain optimal health. In developed countries affluence enables unconstrained caloric intake and possibly inappropriate food choices  (Sloan, Legrand & Chen, 2008).

It is recommended by many authorities to be healthy that people should maintain a normal weight by limiting the consumption of energy dense foods and sugary drinks. People should in take more plant based foods like vegetables. Also limit red and processed meat and limit the drinking of alcohol. Every culture has its bad habits. Bad habits are formed more easily than good habits and are usually the hardest to get rid of. Like smoking, drinking, gambling, over eating and eating fast foods are all examples of bad habits. Nevertheless, some cultural habits are prone to produce more obesity, higher cholesterol, or higher sugar content in the blood, which is increasingly evident in the US. This is due to certain kind of food being consumed in large quantities. Nutrition education is very important in the life of every human being. It helps to make many wise decisions about food. (Salovaara, 2006). For example what type of food to eat, when to eat the foods, how many times you need to take foods eat day and what combination of food provide a healthy diet. Early development of food preferences are important in establishing life-long food habits. Taste preferences such as sweet, sour, salty, bitter and savory preferences have a strong innate component. Components of flavor detected by the olfactory system are strongly influenced by the early exposure (Sloan, Legrand & Chen, 2008).

Here are some eating habits which once you have made them part of your life routine that are sustainable in long term.

Eat healthy unprocessed food

Many of the packaged foods we buy today are aimed at convenience and involve the minimum time of preparation. They often contain high amount of preservatives, man-made colorings, and other chemicals are also added such as 12WBT dietitian George Moore explains, there are other down sides of processed foods.

“Packaged foods tend to be higher in fat, salt and sugar than food cooked from scratch, while lacking nutrients and fibre” she says.

This means unprocessed foods like fresh vegetables, lean meat, eggs and milk and eating more of fruits, nuts and legumes will reap the health benefits. In order to live healthy life we can do the following;

Switch to healthy whole grains

Whole grain offer far more nutrients and fibre than their refined white varieties. They also came out with lower cholesterol. For instance adding whole grain such as quinoa and buckwheat to salads and other meals will add a heap of nutrients. It is usually available in a health food store or the health food aisle of any supermarket.

Change to healthy cooking methods

While cooking try as much to avoid things like deep frying, which drenches your food in unnecessary calories and boiling vegetables until they are drained of color as they will sap them of nutrients that is good for our body.

Eat healthy portion sizes

Just eat as much as required to our body. Over eating will cause bad affects to our health.

Drink plenty of water

Water is essential for life. Water is required for digestion, absorption and transportation of nutrients in our body, for elimination of waste and to regulate body temperature. According to the Australian Dietary Guidelines a healthy amount for men to drink is 2.6 litres per day and women should have 2.1 litres or 8 to 10 glass of water per day.

Now a day in this modern society food advertisement has increased the demand and consumption of particular types of foods. Advertisement usually attract the people to choose certain types of foods often that appears on the television, internet, posters, radio, newspapers and magazines. These advertisements provide information’s to consumers about the foods/product available in market. This can assist the people when making choices. The food preference of people varies from one person to another. Not everyone likes the same foods, but some foods are particularly popular or unpopular among the people.  The taste, appearance and texture of food can affect the people choice of food in different ways ('Influence marketing: how to create, manage, and measure brand influencers in social media marketing', 2013).

The quality of food is most important thing that we should consider while consuming a certain food. This includes external factors such as appearance, size, shape, color, gloss and consistency. Food quality in the United States is enforced by the food safety act in 1990.  Food quality is an important food manufacturing requirement. Sometimes if the quality of foods is not maintained properly it directly affect the health of its consumers. The quality of foods have its impact on consumer demands. On the other hand, at present we have more clear idea and information about what’s better to eat or what’s worse to health.

In conclusion, eating habits are really important for our health. We decide to have various food habits. It is then not a matter of depriving ourselves or forcing ourselves, but simply a conscious recognition of respecting what feels for our body in the long term run.

Reference:

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