D
ietitians often hear some unusual things, because
clients, patients, and other members of the public
have trouble parsing through the myriad claims
they hear about nutrition. Failures in critical
thinking about nutrition are pervasive, and RDs
often educate and advise people who ignore evi-
dence, don’t comprehend evidence, question the importance of
evidence, or make unfounded inferences from available evidence.
Failures in critical thinking can result in unnecessarily compli-
cated diets instead of important dietary changes that really could
improve health.
Behavioral scientists have been studying critical think-
ing failure for decades; much has been learned about why
critical thinking failure occurs and what to do about it. Sincedietitians are at the front lines of major nutrition issues, it’s
beneficial to understand how behavioral science can improve
communication tactics.
As a team of two behavioral scientists and a dietitian, we’ve been
studying how RDs address critical thinking failure. In collaboration
with Today’s Dietitian (TD), we surveyed its readers in April 2019,
receiving almost 900 responses from RDs. In that survey, most
respondents viewed critical thinking as a pervasive problem, with
62% of dietitians seeing “failures in critical thinking about nutrition
(by consumers or patients)” every day or almost every day. Respon-
dents also offered their views on the causes of critical thinking fail-
ure and what needs to be done about it. This article will discuss the
survey responses, add a few observations from behavioral science
research, and offer some recommendations.A survey of Today’s Dietitian readers found that failures in critical
thinking about nutrition are prevalent among clients. Here’s how
behavioral science can help RDs turn the tide so patients can make the
best dietary choices to improve their health.
THINKING
CRITICALLY
ABOUT
NUTRITION
By Jason Riis, PhD; Brandon R. McFadden, PhD;
and Karen Collins, MS, RDN, CDN, FAND36 today’s dietitian august 2019