Only 1 in 4 customers at chain restaurants in Seattle used calorie information on menus when deciding what to eat, and about 4 in 10 didn't even notice the information, a new study says.
Those figures were collected about two years after Seattle launched an experiment to provide restaurant goers with calorie information and, despite what those findings may suggest, it did have an impact, the Los Angeles Times reported.
In the months before calorie posting began in mid-2008, only 8 percent of chain restaurant customers said they considered calorie content when placing their orders, and only 18.6 percent said they even saw calorie counts on menus and serving boards.
Those percentages tripled to 24.8 percent and 59.4 percent, respectively, by December 2010, the Times reported.
The study in the American Journal of Public Health provides insight into the effectiveness of calorie posting, which is now required by federal law at most chain restaurants and eateries nationwide, the Times reported.
In Seattle, calorie information on menus was more likely to be taken into account by white, affluent and better educated people than by those from racial/ethnic minorities, those with low incomes, and those with a high school education or less.
Women and married or "partnered" people were also more likely to take calorie information into account when ordering food, the Times reported.
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