How to Control Mindless Eating

I have a problem. Whenever I eat pizza, I drink beer. I've formed a psychological link between them. That's not necessarily a problem, but it is if I want to eat less. I have two decisions in this case. I can eat pizza or not. I don't have to eat pizza just because it's there. If I decide to eat it, I can drink iced tea instead of beer.

Faced with the pizza conundrum, I can think about it and make sound decisions, or I can mindlessly wolf down pizza and guzzle beer. If I want to control my fate, then I must realize that I have choices, and I must make decisions and act accordingly.

Studies show that weight gain commonly comes from eating as few as 25 extra calories per day. Putting on a pound of fat requires you to eat about 3,500 extra calories, so you'll gain about 2.5 pounds per year from those 25 calories a day. You're 10 pounds overweight after four years.

It turns out that people make about 200 food decisions each day. Making a few more right ones can make all the difference.

Eating seems like a simple activity, but the decisions surrounding it can be complex. When you decide to eat, you make two decisions: 1) what to eat; and 2) how much to eat.

If you want to control what you eat, you need to think about it. Mindless eating can load you down with empty calories. This is clearly a concern if you're trying to lose weight, but even if you're not overweight, thinking about what you eat—and how much—can help you to maintain good health.

Eating decisions can be affected by a host of environmental factors, including packaging, plate size and one's dining companions. I might think that these factors affect others more than myself. I might be wrong.

Understanding the factors affecting your eating decisions can help you to become a thinking—and hopefully healthier—eater.

Environmental factors can influence our ideas of how much we should eat and affect our ability to monitor what we've eaten, explain Brian Wansink, David R. Just and Collin R Payne in the May 2009 American Economic Review.

You might eat more or less, depending on the behavior of a dinner companion. You probably wouldn't order a big steak if the person sitting across from you asked for a small salad, for example. A study has shown that large packages, plates, serving bowls and pantries can substantially increase the amount of food a person eats.

Professor Wansink and his coauthors concluded that, “All of these cues perceptually suggest that a larger amount of food is normal, appropriate, typical and reasonable to consume.” This aligns with anecdotal evidence of everyday cues to overconsumption in our super-sized culture.

They found that people focus more on their food choice than on how much they consume, and they pretty much all underestimate the number of calories they are ingesting. In another study, researchers found that a person's weight didn't affect his estimation of the number of calories in a meal, that people consistently underestimate the caloric value of a meal, and that they more accurately estimated the number of calories in a smaller meal. People tend to eat more calories when they know they're eating a food that's low in fat.

People don't set out to eat a certain amount of food. Tests show that they are very much influenced by the size of a serving bowl, for example. They will also serve more food if they use a larger container. A study of moviegoers showed subjects eating 61 percent more popcorn, which they said tasted relatively unfavorable, if given a large container instead of a small one. They ate 49 percent more of favorable tasting popcorn, and tended to eat more if accompanied by a person of the opposite sex.

You can easily serve serve yourself almost one-third more ice cream if you put it in a larger bowl, and you will likely serve more if you scoop it from its container with a larger spoon.

Evidence indicates that many people rely on external cues to indicate when they should stop eating. For example, an experiment showed that diners eating soup from a bowl that automatically refilled itself ate 73 percent more soup than those eating from a regular bowl. You may think you know when you're full, but you probably don't.

Your mood can affect what you eat. Research shows that people may eat more hedonic foods (such as candy or popcorn) when they're sad and less hedonic foods (e.g., raisins) when happy.

Visibility and convenience are major factors in eating decisions. An article in Appetite indicated that the farther you have to walk to eat something, the less you eat, and the less you think you ate. Chocolate kisses were placed randomly either on secretaries' desks or two meters away. The secretaries consumed 48 percent more candy when it was on their desks. When the candy was out of reach, they thought they had eaten less than they had. They underestimated by 63 percent when out of reach and overestimated by 13 percent when it was on their desks. Placing the candy in a desk drawer resulted in 25 percent less consumption.

You can also consume more when you stockpile food, but only if it's a high-convenience product. So, you might want to refrain from buying case lots of potato chips.

We have seen that eating can be affected by subtle external factors as well as internal issues. We can use this information and devise strategies for smarter eating.

Think each time you dip into the bowl of chips at a party. Remember that you're probably eating more than you realize. Are other snacks available? Eat carrot and celery sticks if offered—and go easy on the dip.

Focus on smaller servings and smaller serving containers. Think about whether you're satisfied, and maintain a distance between yourself and available food if you've had enough. If the bowl is there, you may continue eating. Order a small box of popcorn at the movies, and skip the butter.

Serve food with a smaller spoon, and use smaller bowls or plates for serving. Serve caloric beverages in tall, slender glasses. People tend to pour significantly more into squat, wide glasses. Changing from 12- to 10-inch plates can significantly reduce the amount of food you eat—in this case mindlessly.

Serve meals already plated. Research shows that you eat about 14 percent less food than if you serve yourself at the table.

Make food less visible. If your cupboard or pantry has a door, you should keep it closed. Limit purchases of convenient, high-calorie snacks. Keeping food out of mind and out of the house will limit your consumption.

Borrow a device from dieters: the food diary. Write down everything you eat. Even if you don't know precisely how many chips you ate at a party, you can note that you ate them and determine how many calories are in a serving after you return home. It's all about awareness of what you are eating.

Try snacking with your less dominant hand. A study from the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin showed that people consume as much as 30 percent less when doing this. That can add up to a lot of calories. One reason is that this forces you to think more about what you're eating.

Binge eating differs from other types of mindless eating. You may have engaged in an eating bout sometime during your life. You were bummed, you ate through a half-gallon of ice cream, and then you felt guilty—and still bummed.

A study by the Food and Brand Lab at Cornell University concluded that eating bouts can be triggered by both internal and external cues. Internal cues include unhappiness and boredom. A prime external cue is visibility. If you don't see it, you're less likely to eat it. A person responding to an internal cue it likely to disregard information such as nutritional value and price, whereas the externally cued eater will more likely consider it.

The Food and Brand Lab provides three keys to consider in taming eating bouts.

Be aware of factors that can lead to eating bouts. For example, make food less visible and less available to minimize externally cued eating bouts.

Consider the consequences of eating bouts brought on by moods and cravings.

Understand that eating bouts, once begun, are not guided by reason, and often continue until the food is gone.

Book Review: "Mindless Eating" by Brian Wansink, Ph.D.: Mindless Eating explains how to make small changes in your habits for big payoffs. You can easily lose 30 pounds in a year this way. Anyone interested in eating right is encouraged to read this book.

The Healthiest Fast Food: You can order healthy fast food, but they don't make it easy, and you may be eating more calories than you think. Learn how to order fast food that doesn't go straight to your waistline.

Food in Developing Countries: Policymakers have long tried to end hunger in the developing world. Recent evidence indicates that enhancing nutrition is more effective and less costly.

Consumer Reports "Food & Fitness" Identifies 12 Unhealthy "Health" Foods, Nine Germiest Places in your Kitchen: Consumer Reports has issued a Food & Fitness magazine, on sale through Feb. 12, 2012. Here are tips from the magazine on unhealthy "health" foods, along with ways to keep your kitchen free of bacteria.

National Nutrition Month: March 2012: The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics encourages you to "Get Your Plate in Shape" by eating a balanced diet and watching your intake of calories, sodium and solid fats.