While 38 percent of the respondents to a recent survey conducted by consultancy New Nutrition Business singled out bread as the key culprit behind gastrointestinal distress, 24 per cent said it was good for digestive wellness.
Consumers are confused about what foods are good for digestive health. This was among the findings of the survey, which also revealed that the number of people who believed bread, meat and milk were good for digestion was almost equal to the number of people who believe they were bad.
The survey asked 3,000 people from the United Kingdom, Australia, Spain, Brazil and the United States to rank some common foods as good or bad for their gut health.
And despite kefir and fermented vegetables being hyped as gut health heroes, more people believed bread was good for digestion than believed kefir (17.6 percent) or fermented vegetables (15.8 percent) were good.
Consumers are just as divided over the gut health benefits of milk and meat.
Nearly half of those surveyed, 46.6 percent believed dairy milk was good for digestive health, while 30.6 percent thought milk was bad for their digestion
Just over half (55 percent) said they choose lactose-free foods for their digestive health (although only 15 percent claim to be lactose-intolerant)
For meat, 27 percent of respondents said it was good for digestive wellness, while 33 percent believed it was bad
“Contradictory consumer beliefs about which foods are good or bad for digestive health indicate how strongly attitudes about food and health are fragmented,” stated Joana Maricato, research manager, New Nutrition Business.
“Most people are adopting a wide variety of behaviours in relation to diet and health,” she added.
This is a result of growing mistrust in official dietary guidelines, according to Maricato, and people’s desire to take back control of their diets.
“Changes in dietary advice over the past 15 years have created consumer scepticism about the expert opinions of dieticians and nutrition researchers, just at the moment that technology has made it easier for people to find dietary information for themselves,” she added.
Most respondents (76 percent) said they thought messages about diet and health were confusing. Asked where they learnt about healthy eating and diet, most said they searched online and read blogs, while only 28 percent consulted a nutritionist or a dietitian.
