Sometimes social or circumstantial obligations make it necessary to eat unhealthy food like sweets, and eating junk food can make people feel guilty about their dietary choices. But according to the results of a recent study, when it was someone else’s idea to eat junk food it made subjects feel less guilty, and even feel better after eating it.

Sometimes social or circumstantial obligations make it necessary to eat unhealthy food like sweets, and eating junk food can make people feel guilty about their dietary choices.

But according to the results of a recent study, when it was someone else’s idea to eat junk food it made subjects feel less guilty, and even feel better after eating it.

Lead author of the study, Fangyuan Chen, a doctoral student at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology is quoted as saying: “That is why when a friend orders a delicious desert for you and sort of ‘forces’ you to indulge, your guilt is reduced but you still get to enjoy the vice and so you experience an increase in vitality.”

If eating the junk food wasn’t their choice, subjects felt better about the fact that they had just eaten something unhealthy.

The researchers think that even if it was their idea to eat the junk food, sharing it would reduce the amount of guilt, and make the experience more enjoyable.

The study also examined consumer behavior to see how responsibility affects someone’s enjoyment of products like books, or other more expensive guilty pleasures.