Researching Children's Diets in England: Critical Methods in a Consumer Society

Abstract

How can critical psychological researchers and practitioners respond to current concern about children's diets? This paper argues for a methodological strategy of multiplicity that decentres prevalent concerns with carer-consumers' subjectivity. First, it discusses the notion of alienation and charts the establishment of consumer choice as a regulatory principle in England. It then explores ambiguities of choice and alienation in the life of the consumer. The different narratives of change that are embodied in a British TV programme and an ongoing debate over nutritional labelling are then explored as illustrations of how reliance on subjectivity as a focus of change processes is likely to intensify ambiguity and raise consumers' status anxiety. The paper then examines Cultural and Historical Activity Theory as a potential source of alternatives and argues instead for greater sensitivity to conflicts and coalitions within the multiplicities of “engagements” that form consumer's “perspectives.”

Keywords:

• diet
• children
• multiplicity
• subjectivity