ROLE OF ATTITUDES, DIETARY RESTRAINT, AND FAT AVOIDANCE STRATEGIES INREPORTED CONSUMPTION OF SELECTED FAT-FREE FOODS

The roles of attitudes, dietary restraint, and fat avoidance strategie s in past (reported) and future (forecast) consumption of fat-free foo ds (represented by pound cake, saltine crackers, and processed America n cheese) were studied among 116 adult American subjects using correla tional and multiple regression approaches. The predictive power was hi ghest when the Predictors were specific to the action, i.e. directly r elated to the consumption of fat or fat-free products, but also the co gnitive dimension of restrained eating was related to the consumption of fat-free foods. Both the past and the future consumption were best predicted by two composite scales, one related to the pleasantness of eating fat-free foods and the other on the acquired tendency to substi tute low-fat products for high-fat alternatives. (C) 1997 Elsevier Sci ence Ltd.