nonnourishing

Nonnourishing is an adjective used to describe something that fails to provide nourishment or sustenance. It can refer to foods or beverages that offer little or no calories or essential nutrients, as opposed to nourishing items that supply energy, macronutrients, vitamins, or minerals. The term is more common in descriptive or historical writing than in modern nutrition, where terms such as nutrient-dense, energy-dense, or empty calories are preferred.

In dietary contexts, nonnourishing classifications may apply to substances with negligible caloric or nutritive value, or to meals or regimes that leave a person unsatisfied or continue hunger without delivering nutrients. It can also be used more broadly in figurative language to describe ideas, promises, or rhetoric that do not contribute to a person’s well-being or understanding.

Distinctions: nonnourishing is sometimes used interchangeably with non-nutritive, though non-nutritive more often describes substances that provide sensory or other non-nutritive effects (for example, artificial sweeteners). Nutritional science favors precise terms such as nutrient density, caloric content, essential nutrients, and dietary adequacy.

See also: nourishment, nutrition, nutrient density, empty calories, non-nutritive.