Plates, Pyramids, Or People: Prioritizing Dietary Guidance Communication

A new U.S. symbol for healthy eating doesn’t come along often — the Food Pyramid debuted in 1992, MyPlate replaced it in 2011, and now, more than a decade later, we have the new Food Pyramid. Each arrival brings a wave of attention and second-guessing, and the new Food Pyramid is no exception: within three months of its debut, 83% of Americans said they’d already seen it, according to our newest research report, the 2026 IFIC Food & Health Survey: A Focus on Dietary Guidance & Processed Food. That exceeds reported awareness of MyPlate in both 2024 (76%) and 2025 (77%). In a fractured media environment, that’s no small feat.  

Yet awareness and understanding are not the same thing. While 83% of Americans have seen the new Pyramid, just 54% say they know at least a fair amount about it — still, nearly identical to MyPlate in 2024 (54%) and 2025 (53%). Knowledge of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans themselves sits lower at 42%. Visibility, it turns out, is likely the easier part. 

Seeing a symbol does not mean understanding the guidance behind it, and understanding the guidance does not mean changing what ends up on the plate. Dietary guidance has always been something of an odyssey — a long quest from intention to action — and the distance between the two is where the real work lives. 

The latest Survey bears this out. The most common efforts Americans made over the past year were additive and affirming: eating vegetables and fruits throughout the day (50%) and eating “real food” (49%). And when asked which effort had the greatest impact on their health, eating fruits and vegetables again came out on top. People know the destination. What they need is help getting there. 

One of the clearest signals in this year’s data is how differently Americans experience adding versus removing. Among those who made a given effort, the behaviors rated easiest to sustain were overwhelmingly the inclusive or additive type — consuming dairy (87%), focusing on whole grains (80%), eating vegetables and fruits throughout the day (79%), and eating real food (79%). The behaviors built on restriction or removing were consistently harder: limiting refined carbohydrates (58%), added sugars (60%), and highly processed foods (62%) sat at the bottom with respect to ease. 

The lesson is not necessarily to abandon “eat less” messaging — the Dietary Guidelines rightly continue to reinforce less added sugar, sodium, and saturated fat. Rather, it is that the invitation to add is more compelling, and more durable, than the instruction to take away. 

No topic in food and nutrition today is quite like this one. Is it processed food, highly processed, ultraprocessed or “junk food” (a term coined in 1970 by Michael Jacobson of the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) oriented around processed foods from the start)? The terms keep multiplying, and familiarity is climbing fast: 52% of Americans now say they are familiar with the term “ultraprocessed food,” up 8 points from 2025 and 20 points from 2024. 

Yet familiarity is not a shared definition. Most still reach first for ingredient list to identify such foods, but a growing share go with their gut: 23% now say “I just know what an ‘ultraprocessed food’ is when I see it,” up 12 points from 2025.  

The reassuring part? Whatever we call these foods, the underlying guidance is scientifically steady — less added sugar, sodium, and saturated fat — and reinforced in the most recent Dietary Guidelines. Plus, consumers are dealing with a lot more than just food decisions every day. (For more on how families navigate this, see our additional research on this very topic.) 

So, what are registered dietitians, nutritionists, and other health professionals to do? Largely what we have always done: meet people where they are and offer guidance on the next best step they can take given their personal preferences, goals, and circumstances. The symbol may change and the terminology may multiply, yet our role remains constant. Given the latest consumer insights, a few principles worth carrying into every conversation: 

Because the perfect pairing was never the plate or the pyramid. It is YOU — working alongside the PEOPLE you serve. Plates, pyramids, or people: you already know which one changes the story.