The socio‐cultural aspects of nutrition

Man's nutritional behavior should be studied not only from the physiological and psychological standpoint but also from the socio‐cultural point of view. Man is a social being, his deeply‐rooted food habits have developed within a culture and they vary widely from one society to another. The socio‐cultural factors bearing on food and nutrition range from material technologies to implicit ideologies and symbols, and are interrelated in an original pattern. Techniques such as food production, processing and cooking, and conflicting scales of values should all be taken into account. Although general correlations may seem obvious between food, nutrition and various cultural factors as they appear in our society, we are far from having determined the rules to which food behavior conforms. Although the western industrialized civilization tends to spread throughout the world, we should be careful to analyse painstakingly the socio‐cultmal aspects of each concrete case, and avoid hasty generalizations if we are to make any progress in fundamental research and develop efficient programs aiming at nutritional well‐being.