Walmart was far and away the leader of the grocery industry in the United States in 2017, controlling over a quarter of the market. Kroger, the next largest grocer, was a distant second with a 10 percent market share. Over 40 percent of the grocery market is occupied by smaller retailers. Retail giant Walmart, headquartered in Bentonville, Arkansas, was founded by Sam Walton in 1962. The company not only has the largest share of the U.S. grocery market but is the largest retailer overall in the world. In 2017, Walmart’s revenue exceeded 500 billion U.S. dollars. E-commerce giant Second only to Amazon, a recent survey shows that Walmart is a leading player in the online grocery market space. Food and beverage e-commerce sales of the retailer topped out at over one billion dollars for the U.S. market in 2018. Growth of the company’s e-commerce sales have been extremely strong. Average quarterly growth over the last fiscal year was 40 percent.

Total dollar amount, average dollar amount per agricultural operation, and percentage of local food sales that came from local market channels, by farm size (small, medium and large), 2022.

Motivation

Psychologists and food scientists have, in recent years, produced a great deal of research on a simple question: Do people eat more food if their meals are served on larger plates?

This question is of real practical importance. The ways food is packaged and presented undoubtedly affect how we eat it, and with obesity rates high across the Western world, simple ways to reduce overconsumption of food could have major public health benefits. Perhaps people overconsume food because they tend to eat most of what’s on their plates, leading them to eat more when the plate is large; if so, general advice to buy smaller plates could have a nontrivial effect.

Several experiments suggested this hypothesis is true, and that reducing plate size would help. But some of these experiments were conducted by Cornell University’s Food and Brand Lab, and starting in 2017 researchers started noticing serious problems with the lab’s publications, including miscalculated test statistics, inconsistencies in results, and incorrect descriptions of experimental procedures; since then, many of the lab’s papers have been retracted entirely, and the lab’s director, Brian Wansink, resigned from Cornell. It is not clear which conclusions can be trusted and which cannot.

This study sought to settle the question by conducting a large, carefully designed experiment, whose design and analysis was preregistered so it could not be manipulated once data was collected. In the study, participants were recruited and told they were participating in an experiment “examining the impact of time of the day on a range of mental processes,” and that they happened to be scheduled for a lunchtime session. They were told not to eat anything for three hours before the session; upon arriving, they completed various survey tasks, then were invited to serve themselves from a food trolley. The size of plate they were provided (small or large) was randomly assigned, and the exact quantity of food they consumed was measured (by measuring what was left in the trolley and on their plate). The session was also video recorded by hidden cameras, so researchers could count how many bites the participants took and the rate at which they ate.

Data

Each row of the dataset is one participant in the study. Beyond quantities of food consumed and the rate at which it was consumed, some basic demographic information was collected, as well as several standard psychological tasks.

Note: A value of -999 means that value was not recorded; a value of -888 on a survey question means the participant answered that they would “rather not say.”

Variable Description

• Date Date this participant participated
• ID Participant ID number
• plate.size 0 = small plate, 1 = large plate
• kcal.consumed Total number of calories consumed
• g.consumed Mass of food the participant ate (grams)
• g.served Mass of food the participant put on their plate (grams)
• g.remaining Mass of food left on participant’s plate (grams)
• servings Number of times the participant served themself food
• meal.duration Time from the first bite to the last bite (minutes)
• n.bites Number of bites taken
• bite.size Average bite size (total food mass / number of bites, grams)
• eat.rate Time taken per bite (meal duration / number of bites)
• bite.rate Number of bites per minute
• highest.qual Highest educational qualification. 1 = none, 2 = up to 4 GCSEs, 3 = 5 or more GCSEs or 1 A-level, 4 = 2 or more A-levels, 5 = bachelor’s degree, 6 = post-graduate degree, 7 = rather not say.
• highest.qual.split Highest educational qualification discretized
• income Total household income per year, before tax (self-reported). 1 = up to £4,499; 2 = up to £6,499; 3 = up to £7,499; 4 = up to £9,499; 5 = up to £11,499; 6 = up to £13,499; 7 = up to £15,499; 8 = up to £17,499; 9 = up to £24,999; 10 = up to £29,999; 11 = up to £39,999; 12 = up to £49,999; 13 = up to £74,999; 14 = up to £99,999; 15 = over £100,000
• income.med.split 0 = total household income below median; 1 = total household income above median.
• imd Index of Multiple Deprivation of the area where the participant lives. Measures income, unemployment, education, crime, and other factors related to socioeconomic status and the living environment. Small values mean greater deprivation.
• imd.med.split 0 = IMD below median value; 1 = IMD above median value.
• ssrt Stop Signal Task response time (milliseconds). A task intended to measure participants’ response inhibition and impulsivity; slow response times indicate poor impulse control.
• BIS-TOTAL Total score from the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale. Higher scores indicate greater impulsiveness.
• BIS-Q1 BIS item 1: ‘I plan tasks carefully.’ 1 = almost always/always; 2 = often; 3 = occasionally; 4 = rarely/never.
• BIS-Q2 BIS item 2: ‘I do things without thinking.’ 1 = rarely/never; 2 = occasionally; 3 = often; ...

Total dollar amount, average dollar amount per agricultural operation, and percentage of local food sales that came from local market channels, by farm size (small, medium and large), 2022.

This dataset contains detailed data on bacterial contamination of food items dropped on the ground for specific durations. There are three types of food—apple slices, whole grain bread, and candy—with varying exposure times (1, 3, and 5 seconds) to examine how quickly bacteria could attach and grow on different surfaces.

Below are the following key variables:

• Food Type: Type of food item used (apple, bread, or candy).
• Exposure Time: Time the food item was in contact with the ground (1, 3, or 5 seconds).
• Bacteria Colony Count: Number of bacteria colonies observed over time.
• Colony Size: Average size of the bacterial colonies in each petri dish, recorded daily.
• Observations: Notes on the appearance, color, and characteristics of bacterial colonies over several days.
• Temperature and humidity during the data collection.

It also includes control samples (undropped food items) for comparison, highlighting how bacterial growth varies with time and food type. This dataset provides a comprehensive view of bacterial contamination on different food surfaces, with the potential to analyze time-series growth patterns, compare contamination rates, and determine the validity of the five-second rule under controlled conditions.

Below is an overview of the initial study using the dataset.

This study tests the five second rule, and see if the myth is really true. This topic was chosen because many people could get sick from consuming contaminated food, and need to be sanitary. Moving on, the hypothesis in this experiment is that if a piece of food (apple, bread, candy)is on the ground for one second, bacteria will not be present on the food item. However if a piece of food is dropped and is on the ground for three seconds, bacteria will also not be present on the food. However if a piece of food is on the ground for five seconds, then bacteria will be present on the food item.

To discover if the five second rule is true, the experiment used three different types of food, which is an apple, whole grain bread (without preservatives), and blue jolly ranchers, which is a type of candy (that has preservatives). The experiment used these food items and used each food item for each time touching the ground. After that, bacteria was swabbed from the food item using sterile cotton swabs and transferred to a petri dish (that was made earlier).

After a few days of recording and taking measurements, the knowledge acquired and what happened in the experiment showed that even the shortest time of being on the ground can collect substantial amounts of bacteria that could harm you.

Revenue for the sushi restaurant industry has trended upward during the current period. The industry, which is highly fragmented and consists mainly of small, owner-operator establishments, performed well despite heightened competition from other retailers. Sushi establishments have become popular due to consumers' increased health consciousness and disposable income levels. Industry growth has been further supported by the expanding palates of US consumers, increasingly seeking diverse ethnic cuisines. Nevertheless, the industry contended with challenges stemming from economic uncertainty and high inflation. Industry-wide revenue has been growing at an average annualized 2.4% over the past five years and is expected to total $33.2 billion in 2025, when revenue will rise by an estimated 1.6%. Growing concerns about the dwindling fish population and environmental destruction have led to the emergence of the sustainable sushi model. As a result, sushi restaurants are increasing transparency throughout the supply chain and using ethically sourced ingredients. However, despite increased transparency, news of seafood fraud among sushi restaurants has increased regulatory standards across various state and local governments. Sushi restaurants endure greater scrutiny as officials seek to ensure the fish that restaurants market is the fish customers receive. Nevertheless, demand for sushi remains robust despite controversial findings. Over the past five years, higher minimum wages and input costs have pressured profit growth. The industry will continue expanding as the broader economic landscape improves. Japanese cuisine interest heightened after the nation hosted the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. Also, per capita disposable income and seafood consumption will remain high, bolstering revenue. Industry revenue is forecast to grow at an annualized 1.9% over the five years through 2030 to total $36.4 billion. Growth will be tempered by heightening external competition from grocery stores and other non-restaurant retailers offering sushi products.