Eating out!

Eating out is fun, and restaurants are often create places to spend time.  Restaurants are also designed to encourage you to eat, particularly items that have great profit margins.

Design significantly influences your in-restaurant experiences.  For example:

• Warm colors boost your appetite while cooler colours can suppress it.
• Just seeing images of spicy food leads brings thoughts of aggression to mind – so next time you’re out for Mexican food, and get handed a menu or see images of meal options on the walls, etc.—beware!
• We purchase items that are consistent with our sensory experiences—for example, we’re more apt to buy French wine when we hear French music. In general, we purchase more in restaurants when classical music is played than we do otherwise.  We’ll also wait longer for service when classical music is playing than if it’s not.
• When music that makes us feel good psychologically is playing, we evaluate the food we’re eating more positively—and we’re also willing to pay significantly more when that music is pumped out through the in-restaurant sound system.
• When faster paced music is playing, you eat and drink more rapidly, so there’s more food consumed, or you leave sooner.
• When restaurants are playing softer music we feel calmer and order more healthy food while in louder conditions we’re stressed and often pick less good-for-us options.
• The more you like the design of the space where you’re eating, the more you’re apt to positively evaluate the food you eat there.
• We’re less sensitive to the taste of food when we eat it standing than when we eat the same food sitting down.A benefit:  with pleasant tasting food, you tend to eat less while standing.  You’ll evaluate foods that you eat standing at the bar differently than those you eat sitting at a table.
• When we’re sitting at high tables in a restaurant we’re more likely to eat healthy foods than when we’re hidden away in a booth.
• We eat less at a buffet if the area is laid out so that we see more of what is available before we begin to make selections.