Traci Mann

University of Minnesota Twin Cities | UMN · Department of Psychology

Although average body size in the U.S. has increased in recent decades, stigma directed at individuals with higher weight has not diminished. In this study, we explored this phenomenon by investigating the relationship between people’s perceived social norms regarding higher weight and their reported levels of weight bias (i.e., anti-fat attitudes)...

Individuals fail to suppress certain thoughts, especially under conditions that tax cognitive resources. We investigated the impact of modifying psychological reactance pressures on thought suppression attempts. Participants were asked to suppress thoughts of a target item under standard experimental conditions or under conditions designed to lower...

Self‐regulation plays an important role in health promotion and illness prevention. This section focuses on two concepts central to the study of self‐regulation and health: goal setting and goal striving. Goal setting encompasses processes of goal adoption (e.g., its relationship to the self), motivation (e.g., consequences of intrinsic and extrins...

Background The formation of healthy eating habits is supported by repeatedly eating specific foods, but repetition can also reduce enjoyment of those foods. Making the variety in one’s diet salient increases enjoyment of repetitiously consumed foods in a lab setting. Therefore, in a longitudinal field experiment, we tested a brief intervention to r...

Background: Less than 2% of children in the U.S., ages 9-13, meet the minimum dietary recommendations for vegetable intake. The home setting provides potential opportunities to promote dietary behavior change among children, yet limited trials exist with child vegetable intake as a primary outcome. Strategies to increase vegetable intake grounded...

Objective: To evaluate the impact of a vegetable-focused cooking skills and nutrition program on parent and child psychosocial measures, vegetable liking, variety, and home availability. Design: Baseline and postcourse surveys collected 1-week after the course. Setting: Low-income communities in Minneapolis-St Paul. Participants: Parent-chil...

In the battle to combat obesity rates in the United States, several misconceptions have dominated policy initiatives. We address those misconceptions, including the notion that restrictive diets lead to long-term weight loss, that stigmatizing obesity is an effective strategy for promoting weight reduction, and that weight and physical health shoul...

Objectives: In the popular news media, public health officials routinely emphasize the health risks of obesity and portray weight as under personal control. These messages may increase support for policies designed to reduce rates of obesity, but can also increase antifat stigma. Less often, the media cover 'Health at Every Size' or 'Fat Rights' p...

Research on eating relies on various indices (e.g., stable, momentary, neural) to accurately reflect food-related reactivity (e.g., disinhibition) and regulation (e.g., restraint) outside the laboratory. The degree to which they differentially predict real-world consumption remains unclear. Further, the predictive validity of these indices might va...

Many people want to eat healthier, but they often fail in these attempts. We report two field studies in an elementary school cafeteria that each demonstrate children eat more of a vegetable (carrots, broccoli) when we provide it first in isolation versus alongside other more preferred foods. We propose this healthy first approach succeeds by trigg...

To test the effectiveness of behavioral economics strategies for increasing vegetable intake, variety, and liking among children residing in homes receiving food assistance. A randomized controlled trial with data collected at baseline, once weekly for 6 weeks, and at study conclusion. Family homes. Families with a child (9-12 years) will be recrui...

Objective: People seek out their own idiosyncratic comfort foods when in negative moods, and they believe that these foods rapidly improve their mood. The purpose of these studies is to investigate whether comfort foods actually provide psychological benefits, and if so, whether they improve mood better than comparison foods or no food. Methods:...

Introduction: According to the attentional myopia model, salient cues that serve to inhibit behavior can be especially effective under conditions of limited attention. A small field study tested the implications of this model for smoking reduction. Methods: Twenty-three undergraduate smokers were exposed to a prominent health warning for 2 5-day...

According to an oft‐quoted piece of folk wisdom, if one wants something accomplished, the best person to ask is a busy person. We tested a version of this proposition in two studies. Study 1 exposed participants to a helping request in which cues promoting the relevant behavior were made more salient than those inhibiting it. Study 2 featured a req...

Vegetable consumption in the United States is low despite the wealth of evidence that vegetables play an important role in reducing risk of various chronic diseases. Because eating patterns developed in childhood continue through adulthood, we need to form healthy eating habits in children. The objective of this study was to determine if offering v...

Objective: Explicitly--as opposed to subtly--labeling a food healthy may inadvertently license people to indulge, imply that the food tastes bad, or lead to reactance. We investigated the effects of explicit and subtle health messages on individuals' food selection in two field studies. Method: We manipulated the signs on healthy foods such that...

Craving of unhealthy food is a common target of self-regulation, but the neural systems underlying this process are understudied. In this study, participants used cognitive reappraisal to regulate their desire to consume idiosyncratically craved or not craved energy-dense foods, and neural activity during regulation was compared with each other and...

Behavioral treatments for obesity are not evaluated by the same criteria as pharmaceutical drugs, even though treatments such as low-calorie dieting are widely prescribed, require patients’ time and investment, and may have risks. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has a procedure for evaluating drugs, in which drugmakers must answer the follow...

“Success” in dieting interventions has traditionally been defined as weight loss. It is implicit in this definition that losing weight will lead to improved health, and yet, health outcomes are not routinely included in studies of diets. In this article, we evaluate whether weight loss improves health by reviewing health outcomes of long-term rando...

Objective: The goal of this article is to review and highlight the relevance of social psychological research on self-regulation for health-related theory and practice. Methods: We first review research on goal setting, or determining which goals to pursue and the criteria to determine whether one has succeeded. We discuss when and why people ad...

One of six commentaries on "Obesity: Chasing an Elusive Epidemic," by Daniel Callahan, from the January-February 2013 issue.

Social norms are thought to be a strong influence over eating, but this hypothesis has only been experimentally tested with groups of strangers, and correlational studies using actual friends lack important controls. We manipulate an eating norm in the laboratory and explore its influence within established friendships. In two studies we randomly a...

Published Online: February 1, 2012. doi:10.1001/jama.2012.170 Author Contributions: Dr Mykerezi had full access to all of the data in the study and takes responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis. Study concept and design: Reicks, Redden, Mann, Mykerezi, Vickers. Acquisition of data: Reicks, Redden, Vickers....

This chapter provides a discussion on the psychology of obesity. Four major individual factors have been explored as causes of overeating: interoceptive awareness, response to emotional experience, cognition, and biology. Current research is examining how underlying differences in neurobiology guide eating behavior. The past 50 years of research on...

In their article, Crum, et al. (see record 2011-09907-001) report intriguing results on the power of the mind to determine the body's physiological responses. They find that given the identical milkshake, participants led to believe that the milkshake is a high-calorie, "indulgent" milkshake have an up-and-down ghrelin response that is characterist...

Although persuasive messages often alter people's self-reported attitudes and intentions to perform behaviors, these self-reports do not necessarily predict behavior change. We demonstrate that neural responses to persuasive messages can predict variability in behavior change in the subsequent week. Specifically, an a priori region of interest (ROI...

To test the hypothesis that dieting, or the restriction of caloric intake, is ineffective because it increases chronic psychological stress and cortisol production--two factors that are known to cause weight gain; and to examine the respective roles of the two main behaviors that comprise dieting--monitoring one's caloric intake and restricting one...

Research has begun to reveal the malleability of implicit prejudice. One measure of this construct, the race Implicit Association Test (IAT), represents a widely-used tool to assess individuals' positive and negative associations with different racial groups. In two studies, we demonstrate the capacity of salient pressures to alter implicit racial...

Previous research, restricted to the laboratory, has found that restrained eaters overeat after they violate their diet. However, there has been no evidence showing that this same process occurs outside the lab. We hypothesized that outside of this artificial setting, restrained eaters would be able to control their eating. In Study 1, 127 particip...

The authors describe social psychological research that has found consistent beneficial effects of framing health messages to be congruent with personality factors in encouraging preventive oral health behaviors. The authors describe several studies in which they administered health messages to young adults who did not floss and who were classified...

The authors evaluated the validity of familial enmeshment (extreme proximity in family relationships) as a risk factor for eating disorders across cultural value orientations. They tested the hypothesis that although familial enmeshment may be a risk factor for eating disorder pathology for (1) participants of non-Asian descent or (2) culturally in...

The attentional myopia model of behavioral control [Mann and Ward, 2007] was tested in an experiment investigating the relationship between physiological arousal and aggression. Drawing on previous work linking arousal and narrowed attentional focus, the model predicts that arousal will lead to behavior that is relatively disinhibited in situations...

Background. The authors describe social psychological research that has found consistent beneficial effects of framing health messages to be congruent with personality factors in encouraging preventive oral health behaviors. Methods. The authors describe several studies in which they administered health messages to young adults who did not floss an...

Understanding the triggers of eating in everyday life is crucial for the creation of interventions to promote healthy eating and to prevent overeating. Here, the proximal predictors of eating are explored in a natural setting. Research from laboratory settings suggests that restrained eaters overeat after experiencing anxiety, distraction, and the...

Current authors respond to two comments on their article Medicare's Search for Effective Obesity Treatments: Diets Are Not the Answer (see record 2007-04834-008). The two comments state opposing views of the validity and novelty of the articles conclusions. In his comment, Applebaum (see record 2008-03389-008) claimed that our conclusion is "provoc...

Past research has shown that limitations on attention can lead to loss of control. Our model of self-control suggests that when attentional resources are restricted, individuals can focus on only the most salient behavioral cues, to the neglect of more distal stimuli. Subsequent action is then likely to be under the near-exclusive motivational infl...

Exposure to thin-ideal media has adverse effects on the body satisfaction of women with higher levels of body image disturbance. In a study involving 109 UCLA female undergraduates, we examined the effectiveness of an intervention that was based on downward social comparison theory and the selection of alternative comparison dimensions. All partici...

Discovery of meaning in response to illness has been linked to positive health outcomes. The mechanisms through which this occurs are unknown. This study tests a previously unexamined mechanism, engagement in healthier behaviors, which has been left uncontrolled in most studies. Forty-one HIV-infected women completed a one-month writing interventio...

The prevalence of obesity and its associated health problems have increased sharply in the past 2 decades. New revisions to Medicare policy will allow funding for obesity treatments of proven efficacy. The authors review studies of the long-term outcomes of calorie-restricting diets to assess whether dieting is an effective treatment for obesity. T...

Recent research has documented the effectiveness of tailoring health behavior change messages to characteristics of the recipients, but little is known about the processes underlying these effects. Drawing from the elaboration likelihood model (Petty & Cacioppo, 1986), we examined the role of message scrutiny in moderating the congruency effect (Ma...

The attentional myopia model (T. Mann & A. Ward, 2004) posits that under conditions of limited attention, individuals will be disproportionately influenced by highly salient cues. The "hot/cool" model (J. Metcalfe & W. Mischel, 1999) suggests that cues designed to activate "hot" emotional systems will typically dominate attention and promote releva...

High self-esteem (HSE) is increasingly recognized as heterogeneous. By measuring subtypes of HSE, the present research reevaluates the finding that HSE individuals show poor self-regulation following ego threat (Baumeister, Heatherton, & Tice, 1993). In Experiment 1, participants with HSE showed poor self-regulation after ego threat only if they al...

Two studies examined the capacity of cognitive load to enhance or disrupt the self-control of smoking in the presence of situational pressures that either promote or discourage the behavior. In Study 1, participants who were exposed to cues encouraging smoking smoked more under high cognitive load than under low cognitive load. In Study 2, particip...

Health messages framed to be congruent with individuals' approach/avoidance motivations have been found to be more effective in promoting health behaviors than health messages incongruent with approach/avoidance motivations. This study examines the processes underlying this congruency effect. Participants (undergraduate students, N = 67) completed...

Recent research has documented the eVectiveness of tailoring health behavior change messages to characteristics of the recipients, but little is known about the processes underlying these eVects. Drawing from the elaboration likelihood model (Petty & Cacioppo, 1986), we examined the role of message scrutiny in moderating the congruency eVect (Mann,...

Stress is implicated in the development and progression of a broad array of mental and physical health disorders. Theory and research on the self suggest that self-affirming activities may buffer these adverse effects. This study experimentally investigated whether affirmations of personal values attenuate physiological and psychological stress res...

The authors examined the congruency hypothesis that health messages framed to be concordant with dispositional motivations will be most effective in promoting health behaviors. Undergraduate students (N=63) completed a measure of approach/avoidance orientation (behavioral activation/inhibition system) and read a gain- or loss-framed message promoti...

The attentional myopia model of behavioral control was tested in a study of food consumption by chronic dieters. According to the model, when individuals' attentional capacity is limited, their behavior will be disproportionately influenced by highly salient internal and external cues to the exclusion of more distal stimuli. In situations that norm...

An earlier pilot study found that US DHHS guidelines for antiretroviral treatment were not being successfully implemented (Mann et al., 2000). A brief and inexpensive intervention (visual aid checklist) was developed with the assistance of HIV-expert physicians in order to aid HIV/AIDS health care providers' and their patients' decisions about anti...

Intentional nonadherence occurs when patients deliberately do not take their medications. This phenomenon has not been studied within HIV/AIDS care, a significant omission due to the difficulty of adherence to antiretroviral medications for HIV/AIDS patients and the severe risks associated with nonadherence. The purpose of this study was to explore...

We tested the ability of several social-cognitive models to predict intentions to engage in two different health behaviors (resisting dieting and performing breast self-exam). All constructs from the health belief model (with and without self-efficacy), the theory of planned behavior (with and without perceived behavioral control) and the motivatio...

Rates of eating disorder symptoms were compared between Iranian women living in Iran and Iranian women living in America, in order to assess the impact of Western culture on eating disorders. Women in Iran are mandated by law to cover their bodies with a long veil or overcoat and they have little legal exposure to Western culture and media. Fifty-n...

Nationally, it has been estimated that 44% of adults in the United States have been tested for HIV, with substantial individual and community-level variations in HIV-testing attitudes and behaviors. HIV-testing behaviors and intentions and attitudes toward HIV testing, particularly toward home tests, were assessed among 385 adults recruited in a st...

Eating disorders are among the most common psychopathologies on college campuses. Research on ethnic differences in eating disorder symptoms and prevalence has resulted in conflicting conclusions. Some studies find that particular ethnic groups have a higher prevalence of a symptom; others find that members of that ethnic group have a lower prevale...

The phenomenon of overeating the very foods that one is trying to resist is potentially consistent with both an ironic process account of overeating and a reactance account of the desire for "forbidden fruit." These two models are tested. Participants in two studies were prohibited or not prohibited from eating a food, or they were encouraged to "c...

Optimists (people who have positive expectations about the future) have been shown to perform more health-promoting behaviors than pessimists. This study attempts to alter individuals' levels of optimism, and thereby their health behaviors, by having them write about a positive future. HIV-infected women (N = 40) on combination therapies were rando...

Little is known about the barriers which women living with HIV/AIDS encounter that impede their adherence to antiretroviral medication regimens. Yet in order to design effective interventions to improve women's adherence, it is first imperative to identify the factors that contribute to their non-adherence. The purpose of this study was to explore,...

The meeting during which healthcare providers and newly infected HIV+ patients discuss treatment options is a critical stage in patients' care. We describe 10 interactions between healthcare providers and HIV+ patients at two clinics. Two observers coded each of the 10 interactions for the content of the topics discussed and for communication-relev...

This study developed a two-stage model of decision making used by healthcare providers when considering combination antiretroviral therapy for HIV-positive patients. Provider interviews and patient medical records from 10 HIV-positive patients were utilized. Four providers (two nurse practitioners and two physicians' assistants) situated in two man...

The objective of this study was to assess whether United States DHHS guidelines for treatment with antiretroviral therapies are being implemented by health care providers when discussing treatment options with newly diagnosed HIV patients. Health care providers were observed interacting with HIV patients while making decisions about treatment. Obse...

Past research has shown that strong emotional or motivational states can cause normally restrained eaters to overeat. In this article it is argued that simple cognitive load can also disinhibit eating by restrained eaters. Two studies examined this disinhibition effect. In Study 1, restrained and unrestrained eaters were given the opportunity to co...

Amphetamine use and its correlates are examined among youths living with HIV (YLH) to determine whether its use is associated with increased transmission acts and poor health. Amphetamine use, other HIV-related risk acts, T-cell counts, emotional distress, coping style, and symptoms of HIV are examined in 337 YLH. One third of YLH engaged in amphet...

Several interventions have been implemented to address the adverse psychological and physical consequences associated with bereavement. In this review, we summarize four major theories of bereavement, present a qualitative review of bereavement intervention studies, and assess the overall effectiveness of bereavement intervention studies in a quant...

In this descriptive study, researchers examined pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), and sexual behaviors among 67 HIV-infected young women, as well as the women's outcome expectancies and peer and partner norms regarding pregnancy. Many of the women (69%) had been pregnant; 42% had been pregnant at least once since learning their HIV...

Prevention programs for eating disorders attempt to simultaneously prevent new cases from arising (primary prevention) and encourage students who already have symptoms to seek early treatment (secondary prevention), even though ideal strategies for these 2 types of prevention may be incompatible with each other. In the present study, an eating diso...

We provide evidence that information that organizes interfering text after learning improves recall of original text to which the organizing information does not pertain. Subjects learned two text passages. The second passage was difficult to understand without the aid of a picture that provided the necessary clarifying context. Using the picture a...

As medicine and psychology join forces in the rapidly growing field of health psychology, the opportunity arises for each to benefit from the other. Research in medicine has typically focused on white males in their 30s, while research in psychology has focused on upper-middle-class college sophomores. Both approaches tend to neglect issues of popu...

Why study the health psychology of females separately from males, and homosexuals separately from heterosexuals? In this chapter I argue that a careful study of the health psychology of gender and sexual orientation can have several benefits. Research on specific populations can lead to interventions that are tailored to particular groups, and thes...

Introduction and Methodology: Introduction: Toward a Health Psychology of Special Populations T. Mann, P. Kato. Fear of Heterogeneity in the Study of Human Populations and the Statistical Artifacts It Produces H.C. Kraemer. Lifespan Issues in Health Psychology: Issues of Age and Health M. Pasupathi. Touch Therapies across the Life Span T. Field. Th...

Our experiments demonstrate that interference of an interpolated list of items with recall of an original list can be substantially reduced by forming Ss just before testing how to reorganize and simplify the interpolated material. In Experiments 1 and 2, Ss better recalled an initial serial list of letters when informed at testing that an interpol...

Our experiments demonstrate that interference of an interpolated list of items with recall of an original list can be substantially reduced by forming Ss just before testing how to reorganize and simplify the interpolated material. In Experiments 1 and 2, Ss better recalled an initial serial list of letters when informed at testing that an interpol...

Sustained smoking cessation requires that individuals abstain even while they crave cigarettes. In order to study brain substrates relevant to this behavior, 11 acutely abstinent (overnight) cigarette smokers participated in a “self-control challenge” that utilized a specialized smoking apparatus in conjunction with fMRI. Prior to each trial, the p...

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Stanford University, 1995. Submitted to the Department of Psychology. Copyright by the author.