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- Title
The Waiter's Weight: Does a Server's BMI Relate to How Much Food Diners Order?
- Authors
Döring, Tim; Wansink, Brian
- Abstract
Does the weight of a server have an influence on how much food diners order in the high-involvement environment of a restaurant? If people are paying for a full meal, this has implications for consumers, restaurants, and public health. To investigate this, 497 interactions between diners and servers were observed in 60 different full-service restaurants. Diners ordered significantly more items when served by heavy wait staff with high body mass indexes (BMI; p < .001) compared with wait staff with low body mass indexes. Specifically, they were four times as likely to order desserts (p < .01), and they ordered 17.65% more alcoholic drinks (p < .01). These findings provide valuable evidence in recent lawsuits against weight discrimination, and it suggests to consumers who decide what they will and will not order at a restaurant--such as a salad appetizer, no dessert, and one drink--than to decide when the waiter arrives.
- Subjects
BODY weight -- Social aspects; FOOD service; CONSUMER behavior; PUBLIC health; BODY mass index
- Publication
Environment & Behavior, 2017, Vol 49, Issue 2, p192
- ISSN
0013-9165
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1177/0013916515621108