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CLINICAL TRIAL article

Front. Nutr.
Sec. Nutrition, Psychology and Brain Health
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fnut.2024.1408256
This article is part of the Research Topic Taste and Healthy Eating in the Context of Well-being, Sustainability and 21st Century Food Science View all 10 articles

Initial implicit association between whole grains and taste does not predict consumption of whole grains in low-whole grain consumers: A pilot randomized controlled trial

Provisionally accepted
Angela De Leon Angela De Leon 1*Dustin J. Burnett Dustin J. Burnett 1,2Bret Rust Bret Rust 1Marika Lyly Marika Lyly 3,4Nancy L. Keim Nancy L. Keim 1,2
  • 1 University of California, Davis, Davis, United States
  • 2 Western Human Nutrition Research Center, Agricultural Research Service (USDA), Davis, California, United States
  • 3 VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd, Espoo, Uusimaa, Finland
  • 4 Other, Helsinki, Finland

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Background: Health benefits of whole grain (WG) consumption are well documented. Current Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommend at least half of total grains consumed be WG; however, Americans consume less than one serving of WG per day. Inferior taste of whole grain products as compared with refined grain products has been reported as one of the main barriers to acceptability and consumption of whole grains. In this pilot study, we aimed to determine if mere exposure to WG foods in self-reported low WG consumers would improve their implicit associations between WG and pleasant taste. Methods: Healthy adults (n=45) were provided a variety of WG or refined grain (RG) products for home use for six weeks. Intake was measured by calculating disappearance and verified by a daily log. At the beginning and end of the intervention, we administered an Implicit Association Test (IAT), a computer test designed to measure indirectly the strength of association between pairs of concepts: (a) two contrasted target categories (WG and RG food images) and (b) two contrasted attribute categories (words relating to pleasant or unpleasant taste) via a classification task. Response time was used to calculate IAT D scores, indicating the strength of implicit associations between WG and RG and positive or negative taste. Results: ANCOVA showed that average D scores at the end of the study shifted significantly towards a positive implicit association between WG and good taste (p<0.05) in participants whose baseline D scores indicated an initial preference for RG over WG. No significant differences were found between the WG and RG groups in overall consumption of provided grain products. Conclusions: These findings suggest that mere exposure to WG products over an extended period of time in a free-living situation can improve automatic attitudes toward WG, potentially leading to increased consumption of WG foods. This pilot study is registered at clinicaltrials.gov as NCT01403857.

    Keywords: Implicit association, Implicit Association Test, mere exposure, Taste, whole grain consumption, whole grains

    Received: 27 Mar 2024; Accepted: 13 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 De Leon, Burnett, Rust, Lyly and Keim. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Angela De Leon, University of California, Davis, Davis, United States

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.