Real people, real foods, real eating situations: Real problems and real advantages

It is difficult to disagree with the principal notion put forward by Meiselman (1992): researchers involved in the study of human eating should strive to ensure that their work is, ultimately, of relevance to human eating. Thus, we would support his view that the field would benefit from more experimentation using “real people eating real foods in real eating situations”. There are, however, many shortcomings in the way Meiselman attempts to promote this view. In our response, we have noted some of the problems in Meiselman's paper, and go on to consider some of the reasons why this type of experimentation is not more commonly conducted.