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Love Matters: The Effect of Mating Motive on Female Food Choice

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Abstract

The prevalence of obesity has been increasing globally in recent decades. Behind the phenomenon, high-fat food consumption has been conceived as an important driver. In the current study, we explored whether mating motive caused an effect on female food choice as well as the psychological mechanism underlying it. In Study 1, we recruited 64 participants from a university and asked them to complete a mating prime, after which they would finish a food choice task in which food with different flavors were shown. In Study 2, we replicated Study 1 with a different mating priming method and examined the mediating role of body shaping desire on the relation between mating motive and female food choice. Results showed that: (1) The salience of mating motive decreased female’s high-fat food choice but increased male’s high-fat food choice; (2) the effect of mating motive in females was robust and more salient for sweet food rather than salty food; and (3) the body shaping desire partially mediated the effect of mating motive on female food choice.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author.

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Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 32200874).

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  1. School of Psychology, Nanjing Normal University, Gulou District, 122 Ninghai Road, Nanjing, 210024, China

    Mengyan Yang & Jinlong Su

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  1. Mengyan Yang
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Correspondence to Jinlong Su.

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All procedures met the ethical guidelines of the American Psychological Association, and the study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the School of Psychology, Nanjing Normal University. The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

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Yang, M., Su, J. Love Matters: The Effect of Mating Motive on Female Food Choice. Arch Sex Behav 53, 969–979 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-023-02768-3

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