<p>The term I was looking for was "commensal meals". Indeed, the benefits of commensality are seen in:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>Firefighters, wherein commensality correlated with measures of effectiveness [1].</p></li>
<li><p>The general population of Thailand, wherein commensality correlated with happiness [2]. However, from quickly reading the paper, it's unclear whether this applies as strongly for families as it does for unmarried people.</p></li>
<li><p>Seniors in Japan, wherein commensality is associated with "subjective health, food diversity and food intake frequency" [3].</p></li>
</ol>

<p>However, I didn't find anything relating specifically to room-mates, which seems like a relevant demographic?</p>

<p>[1] "<a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08959285.2015.1021049" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Eating Together at the Firehouse: How Workplace Commensality Relates to the Performance of Firefighters</a>" by Kniffin et al.</p>

<p>[2] "<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4802060/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Health, Happiness and Eating Together: What Can a Large Thai Cohort Study Tell Us?</a>" by Yiengprugsawan et al.</p>

<p>[3] "<a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12603-016-0805-z" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Eating together is associated with food behaviors and demographic factors of older Japanese people who live alone</a>" by Ishikawa et al.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-04-16T23:58:50.550Z
2018-04-16T23:58:50.550Z
Seanny123
<p>The benefits of eating dinners with your family are documented in "<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15289253" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Correlations between family meals and psychosocial well-being among adolescents</a>" by Eisenberg et al. However, is there evidence that this applies also applies to other family-like communities? For example, are the benefits to coworkers or friends cohabiting eating together on a regular basis?</p>

<social-psychology><reference-request>
Benefits of social eating outside of family units
Seanny123
# Benefits of social eating outside of family units

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-04-16)

The benefits of eating dinners with your family are documented in "[Correlations between family meals and psychosocial well-being among adolescents](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15289253)" by Eisenberg et al. However, is there evidence that this applies also applies to other family-like communities? For example, are the benefits to coworkers or friends cohabiting eating together on a regular basis?

**Tags:** social-psychology, reference-request


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_0 on 2018-04-16. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

The term I was looking for was "commensal meals". Indeed, the benefits of commensality are seen in:

1. Firefighters, wherein commensality correlated with measures of effectiveness [1].
2. The general population of Thailand, wherein commensality correlated with happiness [2]. However, from quickly reading the paper, it's unclear whether this applies as strongly for families as it does for unmarried people.
3. Seniors in Japan, wherein commensality is associated with "subjective health, food diversity and food intake frequency" [3].

However, I didn't find anything relating specifically to room-mates, which seems like a relevant demographic?

[1] "[Eating Together at the Firehouse: How Workplace Commensality Relates to the Performance of Firefighters](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08959285.2015.1021049)" by Kniffin et al.

[2] "[Health, Happiness and Eating Together: What Can a Large Thai Cohort Study Tell Us?](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4802060/)" by Yiengprugsawan et al.

[3] "[Eating together is associated with food behaviors and demographic factors of older Japanese people who live alone](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12603-016-0805-z)" by Ishikawa et al.


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