An Empirical Examination of the Influences of Portion Size, Context and Package Characteristics on U.S. Snack Food Consumption

Using a unique panel of over 40,000 U.S. snack food consumers from 2004-2010, we build a three-dimensional model to consider how portion sizes, the context of consumption, and package characteristics jointly affect the amount of food consumed. In concert with prior experimental results, we find that consumption does increase with larger portions. However, this effect diminishes significantly when accounting for the consumption context and packaging characteristics. The most important predictor appears to be how the snack food is presented to consumers at the point of consumption, i.e. the type, size and quantity of packages. Among a host of other findings, snacking on impulse, alone, with a beverage, and/or while watching television or otherwise busy increases the amount consumed, while snacking at home and/or while socializing decreases consumption. Furthermore, when consumers have more than one package in inventory, they tend to snack more. These results suggest several avenues for future research.