Cognition for dinner

Neglecting health consequences when establishing dietary habits can lead to poor health outcomes. Earlier research has argued that counterproductive behavioral outcomes may be caused by resource scarcity, forcing individuals to shift cognitive resources towards dealing with immediate expenses and neglecting decision–making in other avenues as well as increasing overall cognitive load. We examine how impaired cognitive function affects the decision–making process of meal choice through an online experiment. We experimentally prime richer and poorer individuals to consider varying levels of immediate financial expenses and examine how that affects their meal choice by means of a discrete choice (stated choice) experiment. Our results indicate weak mixed evidence suggesting that poverty impedes cognitive function. We do not find evidence of reduced cognitive function negatively affecting healthy meal choice among the poor relative to the rich. A power analysis indicates that our research is underpowered and we highlight potential issues with our experimental approach.