David B. Allison

Dr. David B. Allison is a Professor of Biostatistics at University of Alabama at Birmingham, where one of his top research interests is obesity. He has served on nutrition advisory boards for Kraft Foods and received the 2002 Lilly Scientific Achievement Award from The Obesity Society.

In 2008, Dr. Allison created a controversy by writing a document on behalf of the New York State Restaurant Association, a group opposed to New York City's menu labeling rules. The New York State Restaurant Association paid Dr. Allison for his assistance. As an obesity expert, Allison argued against New York City menu labeling rules. He reasoned that if consumers saw the number of calories in their food on the menu, they might eat too little and come away hungry, only to return and gorge themselves on too much food later. Of course, consumers see calorie information on labels all the time at the grocery store and they have been able to handle the burden without trouble.

The restaurant industry front group Center for Consumer Freedom wasted no time in taking advantage of Dr. Allison's expert opinion. They posted on their website that Dr. Allison showed no evidence that nutrition labeling would decrease the calories consumers ate but may in fact increase the number of calories eaten due to the reason given above (that they might fail to eat enough at first only to come back and gorge later).

External Sources

 * Dr. David B. Allison faculty profile, University of Alabama at Birmingham
 * The Obesity Society
 * "Conflict on the Menu," New York Times, February 18, 2008
 * Menu Labeling Meltdown, Center for Consumer Freedom