Lesson 4.3.6.1

4.3.6.1 Explanations for food preferences Quiz: AQA Psychology, Unit 3

20 questions

Written by Revision Ninja · Last reviewed 11 October 2026

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Lesson 4.3.6.1, Explanations for food preferences: 20 multiple choice questions for the AQA Psychology (7182), Unit 3: Issues and options in Psychology, written with Revision Ninja.

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The 20 questions

  1. What is the term for an innate reluctance or fear of eating new foods?

    • Disinhibition
    • Taste aversion
    • Anorexia nervosa
    • Neophobia

  2. What causes a taste aversion to develop towards a specific food?

    • Inherited genetic traits
    • High calorie content
    • Lack of exposure
    • Association with illness

  3. Which psychological approach explains food preferences in terms of adaptive survival mechanisms?

    • Behavioural explanation
    • Cognitive explanation
    • Evolutionary explanation
    • Psychodynamic explanation

  4. Which process forms part of the social learning explanation for food preferences?

    • Natural selection
    • Genetic predisposition
    • Vicarious reinforcement
    • Hypothalamic regulation

  5. A child accepts a new food after observing a parent eat it. Which mechanism explains this?

    • Innate taste preference
    • Classical conditioning
    • Biological preparedness
    • Parental modelling

  6. A person avoids eating shellfish after experiencing food poisoning from it once. What is this called?

    • Social learning
    • Taste aversion
    • Food neophobia
    • Operant extinction

  7. Repeatedly serving a specific vegetable at family meals increases a child's preference for it. Which factor explains this?

    • Evolutionary adaptation
    • Innate preference
    • Repeated exposure
    • Biological preparedness

  8. Why is the evolutionary explanation of food preferences difficult to test scientifically?

    • Lack of genetic data
    • Ethical restriction on trials
    • Too many human subjects
    • Unobservable ancestral environments

  9. Which finding provides strong evidence that human food preferences are learned rather than innate?

    • High energy density
    • Cultural variations
    • Innate taste aversion
    • Universal sweet preference

  10. Which biological concept challenges the view that food preferences are entirely learned through culture?

    • Biological preparedness
    • Social contagion
    • Vicarious punishment
    • Classical extinction

  11. What is the primary evolutionary benefit of food neophobia?

    • Promoting social bonding
    • Enhancing taste sensitivity
    • Preventing poisoning
    • Increasing calorie intake

  12. Which process explains why liking for a novel food increases with repeated exposure?

    • Classical conditioning
    • Mere exposure effect
    • Social learning theory
    • Operant conditioning

  13. What is a major limitation of evolutionary explanations of food preferences?

    • Overemphasising learning
    • Ignoring cultural variation
    • Ignoring taste aversion
    • Lacking biological credibility

  14. Which learning process involves developing food preferences by observing role models?

    • Operant conditioning
    • Classical conditioning
    • Social learning theory
    • Vicarious punishment

  15. What term describes avoiding a food after experiencing sickness following its consumption?

    • Satiety
    • Leptin resistance
    • Taste aversion
    • Food neophobia

  16. Which cross-species behaviour supports the evolutionary explanation of food preferences?

    • Cultural cooking techniques
    • Neophobia in animals
    • Language transmission
    • Operant conditioning

  17. Which combination best explains the development of specific human food preferences?

    • Genetics alone
    • Hormonal triggers
    • Innate biases and learning
    • Purely cultural conditioning

  18. According to learning theory, what strategy best reduces a child's food neophobia?

    • Single aversion therapy
    • Genetic modification
    • Sensory deprivation
    • Observational modelling

  19. What behaviour challenges the view that taste aversion relies solely on personal illness?

    • Preference for fat
    • Liking sweet flavours
    • Avoiding untasted foods
    • Eating familiar foods

  20. What psychological process demonstrates that food preferences are not entirely fixed at birth?

    • Innate neophobia
    • Genetic mutation
    • Exposure-driven liking
    • Hormonal adaptation

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