Neuromarketing and Neurogastronomy: An Ethical Perspective on Food Consumption. Tools for Sustainable Gastronomy

The chapter identifies the main strategies of food neuromarketing and their possible impacts not only on the consuming population but also on environmental harm related to the ecological footprint; it proposes actions to mitigate their damaging effects and analyzes the contributions of neurogastronomy to the promotion of healthy food consumption. The methodology was based on a theoretical-reflective essay. The work comprises three sections. The first addresses strategies of societal manipulation and sales tools for food purchasing: neuromarketing, neurogastronomy, and neuroethics. A second section reviews ethical studies in neuromarketing research and emphasizes that its abuse can reduce the concept of consumption to a merely neuronal activity in which consciousness is undervalued. The third section analyzes possible alternatives for mitigating the harmful effects of marketing neurosciences on food consumption, as well as the capitalization of neurogastronomy and of community methodologies that may foster the recovery, conservation, and care of sustainable gastronomy, so as to influence healthier habits among consumers and to provide tools that sharpen awareness and generate individual, family, community, and educational strategies toward a transition to the enjoyment of nutritious and sustainable eating. Finally, it proposes the recovery of participatory community methodologies and the academic involvement of universities, where students, faculty, and the community form synergies and their representatives are integrated into research ethics committees, in order to ensure that projects demonstrate social and environmental responsibility that, in the short term, can prevent harm to food consumers and, in the long term, contribute to reducing the ecological footprint.