Psychology of Eating
Thursdays, 9-11:30 am, 5461 Franz
Instructor: Traci Mann, Ph.D.
Office: 5627 Franz
Office Hours: Thursdays, 3-4 pm
Class Format
Because this course is a seminar, its success is based on both the efforts of the instructor and on
the efforts of the participants: We will be learning together. To help stack the deck toward a
successful course, I am making discussion participation and discussion leading worth a fairly
large part of your grade.
Each week you will be responsible for reading the articles in the reader. There are usually three
articles per week, and I have tried extremely hard to not be unreasonable about the reading load.
The reader can be purchased from Course Reader Material at 1137 Westwood Blvd (between
Kinross and Lindbrook). The phone number there is 443-3303.
Class Participation
Part of your grade will be based on class participation. To prepare, you should carefully read
and be familiar with the assigned readings. You may also want to make a note of a few issues or
questions that you would like to discuss. To earn the maximum amount of points for
participation, you need not (indeed, you should not) dominate discussion. You merely need to
contribute to the discussion each session and help it move forward. While I strongly encourage
you to do all the readings, if for some reason you have not thoroughly read all the articles on a
particular week, you should not feel that you cannot add to the discussion. You can and you
should.
Leading Class Discussion
Each class member will be required to lead class discussion one time during the quarter. You
will choose your session on the first day. Leading class discussion is more difficult than most
people realize. I encourage you to prepare thoroughly for this role. First, consider how you want
to organize class. Depending on the nature of the readings, class might be ideally divided up into
separate sections for each article, or in other cases, the articles can all be discussed together.
However you decide, you are in charge of the clock, of keeping discussion on track, and of
preventing ridiculous digressions and encouraging useful ones. I’ll be there to work on this with
you, of course, and I won’t let anything awful happen.
I find it helpful if the leader starts with an overview that includes a summary of the readings.
Often in seminars people jump right to the critiquing of the readings before everyone in the room
is clearly up to speed on what the readings say. I encourage you to allot a reasonable amount of
time to just reviewing what the readings say before opening the floor for criticism. Once
everyone is clear on what the readings say, you can move the discussion to a few key questions
or thoughts that you want the discussion to be structured around. To get people talking
(remember, the class meets at 9 am), you might want to start with a discussion question that
allows people to talk about their personal experiences. Then you can move into the more
technical issues.
Feel free to be creative. You may want to try to structure a discussion around solving a fairly
specific problem. Some of the topics of the course lend themselves well to this type of
discussion, in which the goal is to design an experiment.
It is often useful to prepare a handout with bullet points of discussion questions or topics. The
hand-out might also contain a summary of the readings. This could help structure discussion. If
you do prepare a handout, I will be happy to make copies of it for you the day before class.
The day you lead discussion, you will be encouraged to bring a food item for the class that has
particular meaning for you or that is particularly interesting to you. It should be a snack, not a
meal, and it should be a food (or drink) that we can ponder. Be prepared to tell us what that food
means to you, or in some other way to tie it into the discussion. If this assignment provides you
with a financial hardship, please tell me and I will help out. (With that said, I don’t expect
anyone to spend more than a tiny bit of money on their food item.)
Reaction Papers
For four of the remaining nine weeks (as you choose), you will be expected to turn in a short
reaction paper on the assigned readings from that week. Papers will be due at the beginning of
class, and will not be accepted late. Each paper should be approximately 2 pages, doublespaced. The purpose of these papers is twofold: First, they should help you read the weekly
assignments critically and thoroughly, and second, they should help generate discussion. I will
comment on the papers and grade them on a check plus/check/check minus basis.
A reaction paper features your intellectual reaction to a topic covered in the course reader. A
"topic" can be a phenomenon, a theory, a concept, an experiment, and so forth. The ideal start is
to think about which issues in that week’s readings have grabbed, bothered, or puzzled you.
Once you have an idea for a topic, choose the type of paper you want to write. You may critique
an article you read; propose a new experiment that would clarify open questions; or apply issues
or comments from previous sessions to the current readings. You may start with your own
everyday observations and develop a theoretical analysis; or you may start with a theoretical
prediction and apply it to your own life. All papers should be short and to the point. So tell your
reader what you are planning to do in the first paragraph. Then, in the remaining space,
implement this plan. No matter what type of paper you choose to write, you must clearly go
beyond summarizing other people's thoughts. A mere summary of the reading material is not
acceptable.
Final Paper
You will be required to write a final paper (5-7 pages, double-spaced). It will be due at noon on
the Thursday of exam week. I will not accept late papers. If you give me your paper at least one
week early, I will be happy to provide early feedback and editing comments.
In the paper you should propose an experiment to test some hypothesis relevant to eating
generated either from class discussion or the readings. The experiment should be ethically
acceptable and pragmatically viable. Write the paper like an introduction and methods section
for an APA empirical journal article.

In the introduction, give a concise description of the literature that led to your hypothesis.

Describe a sufficient amount of literature to justify your study. In the last paragraph of your
introduction, clearly state your hypothesis and your independent and dependent variables.

Divide your method section into the usual parts (participants, procedures, etc). As with all
methods sections, the goal is to give enough information so that your readers can replicate
the study, should they desire.

After the methods section, discuss in a paragraph or two the strengths and weaknesses of
your methods. Explain what your study would be able to address and what it would not be
able to address.

List your references in APA style at the end. I will not be particularly picky about the
formatting, but I will be interested in seeing what you cite.
Grading
Your grade will be based on the following items:
1. Your final paper
30%
2. Your reaction papers
20% (4 papers @ 5% each)
3. Leading discussion
25%
4. Class participation
25%
Reading List
Week 2: Physical Effects of Human Starvation
Keys, A., Brozek, J., Henschel, A., Mickelsen, O., Taylor, H.L. (1950). The Biology of Human
Starvation, Volume I. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
Chapter 4: General features of the Minnesota experiment
Chapter 5: Body weight (selections)
Chapter 17: Basal metabolism (selections)
Week 3: Psychological Effects of Human Starvation
Keys, A., Brozek, J., Henschel, A., Mickelsen, O., Taylor, H.L. (1950). The Biology of Human
Starvation, Volume II. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
Chapter 38: Behavior and complaints in experimental starvation and rehabilitation
Chapter 41: Psychological case studies
Chapter 42: Psychological effects – interpretation and synthesis
Week 4: What Makes People Obese?
Gladwell, M. (1998). The Pima Paradox. The New Yorker, February 2.
Bouchard, C. (2002). Genetic influences on body weight. In C. Fairburn & K. Brownell (Eds.)
Eating Disorders and Obesity (2nd Ed.). New York, NY: Guilford Press. Skim.
Keesey, R. & Hirvonen, M. (1997). Body weight set-points: Determination and adjustment.
Journal of Nutrition, 127, 1875S-1883S.
Garner, D. & Wooley, S. (1991). Confronting the failure of behavioral and dietary treatments for
obesity. Clinical Psychology Review, 11, 729-780. Read pages 741-750 only.
Week 5: Is it Unhealthy to be Fat and Will Dieting Fix it?
Garner, D. & Wooley, S. (1991). Confronting the failure of behavioral and dietary treatments for
obesity. Clinical Psychology Review, 11, 729-780. Read pages 733-740 only.
Wickelgren, I. (1998). Obesity: How big a problem? Science, 280, 1364-1367.
Ernsberger, P. & Koletsky, R. (1999). Biomedical rationale for a wellness approach to obesity:
An alternative to a focus on weight loss. Journal of Social Issues, 55, 221-260.
Week 6: Restraint and Binge Eating
Herman, C.P. & Mack, D. (1975). Restrained and unrestrained eating. Journal of Personality,
43, 647-660.
Polivy, J. & Herman, C.P. (1985). Dieting and binging: A causal analysis. American
Psychologist, 40, 193-201.
Week 7: Stress, Emotion, and Eating
Greeno, C. & Wing, R. (1994). Stress-induced eating. Psychological Bulletin, 115, 444-464.
Macht, M., Roth, S., & Ellgring, H. (2002). Chocolate eating in healthy men during
experimentally induced sadness and joy. Appetite, 39, 147-158.
Week 8: Social, Cognitive, and Environmental Aspects of Eating
Clendenen, V., Herman, C.P., & Polivy, J. (1994). Social facilitation of eating among friends
and strangers. Appetite, 23, 1-13.
Rozin, P., Dow, S., Moscovitch, M., & Rajaram, S. (1998). What causes humans to begin and
end a meal? A role for memory for what has been eaten, as evidenced by a study of multiple
meal eating in amnesic patients. Psychological Science, 9, 392-396.
Young, L. & Nestle, M. (2002). The contribution of expanding portion sizes to the US obesity
epidemic. American Journal of Public Health, 92, 246-249.
Week 9: Developmental Factors in Food Selection
Davis, C. (1939). Results of the self selection of diets by young children. Canadian Medical
Association Journal, 41, 257-261.
Birch, L. (1999). Development of food preferences. Annual Review of Nutrition, 19, 41-62.
Week 10: Sociocultural Factors in Food Selection/Chocolate Craving
Rozin, P. (1996). Sociocultural influences on human food selection. In E. Capaldi (Ed.), Why
We Eat What We Eat: The Psychology of Eating. Washington, DC: American Psychological
Association.
Rozin, P. & Schiller, D. (1980). The nature and acquisition of a preference for chili pepper by
humans. Motivation and Emotion, 4, 77-101.
Michener, W. & Rozin, P. (1993). Pharmacological versus sensory factors in the satiation of
chocolate craving. Physiology & Behavior, 56, 419-422.