Not Hungry? How about the "Ladies' Cut" Steak?

Can the label used to describe the size of a steak dramatically influence your willingness to order it at a restaurant? Are we so affected by these labels that we won't buy a product just because of how its size is described? Seems ludicrous, right? But a ton of research on "reference group influence" has shown that we go out of our way to identify with certain groups and dissociate ourselves with other groups.

But in a study recently published in the Journal of Consumer Psychology, authors Katherine White and Darren Dahl wanted to see whether our desire to avoid associating with certain groups can be used to manipulate our choices. Their experiment was simple. Subjects were asked to look at a menu and pick an item to eat. They were told they were in the mood for steak, but not too hungry. The menu they were given had a 12oz steak and a 10oz steak. The 12oz steak was always referred to as the "House Cut." However, for the 10oz, half the subjects saw it labeled as "Chef's Cut" and the other half saw it labeled as "Ladies' Cut." Just this labeling had a huge effect on men. When the 10 oz was called the "Chef's Cut," 47% chose this and 53% chose the 12 oz. However, when it was labeled "Ladies' Cut," only 5.3% chose the 10oz and 94.7% chose the larger "House Cut." If you are a restaurateur, here's an easy way to move people to a larger and more expensive item on your menu. For women, of course, the "ladies' cut" label had no effect on choice. Interestingly, men also rated the 12oz steak significantly more favorably than the 10oz steak in the "ladies' cut" condition, but not in the "chef's cut" condition. This effect was dramatically reduced when subjects in a follow-up experiment were told they would be having the dinner they ordered alone in their room. Thus, it was the concern for what other people would think (if a man ordered the "ladies' cut") that drove their choices.

Isn't it fascinating how just the label given to an item can so strongly affect our choices? It becomes particularly worrying when we consider how this tendency can be used to manipulate our choices. The use of reference groups in advertising (the cool people all use the product) is an application of this effect. A third study showed the effect of "ladies' cut" on men's choices was reduced for men who had low levels of "public self-consciousness." Perhaps the way to reduce obesity is to label all servings over a certain size the "Fat Man Meal" or something like that. Or, maybe if we were all a little less concerned about what other people think, we'd be less susceptible to such manipulation.