Interestingly enough, it has been shown that naive allocation can be used by restaurants to encourage patrons to order a healthier meal. If healthy foods are dispersed throughout the menu, in several different categories, and unhealthy foods are restricted to one category, people will tend towards ordering more healthy food options and fewer unhealthy food options.10
As an example, a restaurant menu may be split into the categories of “appetizers”, “entrees” and “desserts” or the categories of “appetizers”, “entrees”, “cookies”, “cakes”, and “ice creams”. The former will encourage less unhealthy eating than the latter. This is because, as is explained by naive allocation, we like to divide our resources among the categories presented to us. Therefore, while the first menu might prompt us to order one item from the “dessert” section of the menu, the second menu might prompt us to order multiple desserts, so that we can sample something from each of the categories.
Similarly, this strategy can be used to encourage patrons to order more healthy meal options by further dividing healthy foods into many categories. As opposed to “appetizers” and “entrees”, a menu using titles such as “salads”, “soups”, “vegetables”, “fruits”, “seafood”, and “chicken” will encourage people to order a variety of healthy foods, instead of filling up on dessert.