How many times do we discuss food with friends and acquaintances? Those who want it cooked, those who want it raw, vegans who hate carnivores, those who eat meat hate those who are "obsessed" with a vegetable diet, not to mention all whims more or less justified, from food intolerances to the great (and highly overrated) gluten-free trend. Here, behind all these choices and the related discussions there is a precise psychology, which was studied by Nicoletta Cavazza and Margherita Guidetti, two professors of social psychology at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia who tried to get to the bottom of the diatribe by publishing the essay Food Choices (Il Mulino).
The work of the two experts demonstrates above all that in contemporary society it is more difficult than ever to identify a shared food model, and that taste is now only one (perhaps not even the first) of the factors that determine our choices at the table, which often become actual religious beliefs. Indeed, on the one hand there is an increasing attention to food, perhaps disproportionate and encouraged by the overdose of cooking programs and healthy (or pseudo-healthy) food trends, on the other hand, however, the daily time dedicated to preparing meals is decreasing (excluding this exceptional quarantine phase): from 4 hours in the 50s to 37 minutes today (pre-coronavirus, of course).
Hence the intersection of these two factors (a lot, too much information and little time) determine what the two doctors call "cognitive shortcuts". The first example is that of "without" products, which it is not known why they must always be preferable: fat-free, gluten-free, sugar-free. The first objective is therefore to avoid damagerather than to obtain a benefit. Then there is the "politicization" of choices and the consequent debate on food. Conservative people (generalizing we could say "of the right") increasingly show "neophobic" attitudes, ie aversion to new foods.
Conversely, anyone who is or defines himself as progressive does not despise open-mindedness and experimentation even at the table. “Basically, we have learned to associate food innovations with minorities”, explain the two teachers from Emilia. Another connected phenomenon, and objectively more and more rampant, is that of vegephobia, that is hatred towards those who do not eat meat: vegans, in many parts of the world and above all in the USA, are seen even worse (assuming that the same yardstick is unjustified) than homosexuals and immigrants. In short, food unites less and less and divides more and more, with the different factions of ultras just like when it comes to football, politics,…. All.
