What Are You Really Hungry For?

If you’re like most people in our culture, you don’t just eat when you’re hungry and you don't stop when you’re full. We have the luxury of living in a land of food abundance, but it comes at a price.

Psychologist Kelly Brownell, dean of the school of public policy at Duke University and formerly the director of Yale’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity, refers to the United States as a “toxic food environment.” What he means is that everywhere we turn, low-cost, high-calorie foods tempt us. And there is a massive marketing machine behind these foods—powered in part by psychologists and other scientists who know exactly the most powerful way to display things, use the power of scent, and create the most attractive images.

Combine this abundance with stress, loneliness, the need to unwind, and other modern concerns, and you may find yourself living in an unhealthy pattern. Typically, these feelings combine with an automatic negative way of thinking and result in overeating or unnecessary snacking.

3 Common Reasons We Eat When We’re Not Hungry

Stress.

Do you find yourself walking in after a hard day’s work and heading straight to the fridge or the snack cupboard? Are you actually hungry? Is food the solution to feeling stressed and needing to unwind? Consider a more targeted alternative solution, maybe involving a quick walk around the block before walking in the door. Or maybe changing into more comfortable clothes would feel good. Or listening to relaxing music instead of the news would help you make the transition from work to commute to home without it ending in overeating or snacking.

Loneliness.

Along with the end of your day, weekends, or any other times you find yourself alone, are other high-risk times for snacking or overeating. Are you actually hungry? Is food the solution to your feelings of isolation? Connecting with friends or joining clubs, classes, or other activities are probably a better fit for this need than filling the void with food. When you’re feeling lonely, consider all the things you could do to help you feel more connected to friends and family, in person or via phone, email, or social media. There are myriad ways to end that feeling of isolation. Food won't do it.

Boredom.

Do you find yourself rummaging around the kitchen and snacking when you have nothing else to do? Are you actually hungry? Is food the solution to the problem when you can’t find something that interests you? Consider hobbies that you used to find enjoyable. Consider things you’ve never tried but have sparked your imagination. When you’re bored, finding ways to engage your interest and imagination is the solution. This is what you are actually craving. If you take some time to consider other options, before you get bored, you'll have a ready set of potential solutions that won’t involve food.

The bottom line: Ask yourself, What am I really hungry for? If it’s not food, then it’s time to start finding some real and effective alternatives.

Via Psychology Today

The real effect of pornography on relationships.

You might think viewing pornography can’t hurt a real-life relationship. Some even claim that erotic material impacts their relationships in positive ways. So a team of researchers at Florida State University developed an experiment to determine how consuming pornography affects adults' commitment to romantic relationships.

The research team recruited college students who were in heterosexual relationships and who viewed pornography on a regular basis. They were told the study was an investigation of “self-control” and were randomly assigned one of two activities to abstain from for a period of three weeks. Half of the students were asked to avoid looking at all materials showing nudity or sex, including websites, videos, and magazines. They were encouraged to be honest and to record in a daily calendar if and when they were not successful. The others were asked to abstain from eating their favorite food. At the end of the three weeks, both groups were asked how committed they were to their relationship.

The Result: The people who eliminated or significantly reduced their viewing of pornographic material were significantly more committed to their relationships than those who continued to view the material. These results held true for both men and women.

Feeling less committed to a relationship is one thing. But does the use of pornography also translate into an increased risk of infidelity? At least among college students, the answer appears to be yes. In a follow-up study, the researchers asked 240 men and women to fill out questionnaires on their pornography viewing habits, their relationship commitment, and how many people they “hooked up” with in the last year, other than their current partner. They found that as pornography consumption increased, relationship commitment decreased, and the likelihood of having sex with others increased. The researchers concluded: “Pornography consumption is not only related to weakened commitment in relationships but to the consequences of that decreased commitment, like infidelity.”

Why Is This Happening?

One way to answer this question is to consider the factors that predict relationship commitment. One is whether or not we perceive we have attractive alternatives to our existing relationship. When we believe that our prospect for attractive partners is abundant, we will be less committed to the relationship we already have. Interestingly, this phenomenon seems to hold true whether the alternatives are real and concrete, or whether the alternatives are only in our imagination. It doesn’t seem to matter if a potential partner is standing in front of us or if we’re viewing an attractive porn star on a computer. While porn actors are not really an option for most of us, spending time in their company can give us the impression that we live in a world with many available alternatives. And when we believe we have other attractive choices, we’re instinctively less committed to the partner we already have.

We may think it doesn’t matter where we place our attention, or that viewing pornographic materials will spice things up in bed with our existing partner. But what and whom we focus on, and what we choose to ignore, makes a big difference when it comes to maintaining our commitment to an existing relationship. If you value your relationship and want to remain loyal to your partner, be mindful of where you place your attention. Focus on your lover and the realness of that interaction and leave the fake thrills of pornography behind.

Psychology Today

Sucking the Marrow out of Life – with Ritual

“As I ate the oysters with their strong taste of the sea and their faint metallic taste that the cold white wine washed away, leaving only the sea taste and the succulent texture, and as I drank their cold liquid from each shell and washed it down with the crisp taste of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and to make plans.”

― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast p. 6

Perhaps no one embodied lust for living like Ernest Hemingway. Whether dodging bulls and bullets in Spain, deep-sea fishing off Panama, or big-game hunting in Kenya, “Papa” was all-in. And, as the quote above conveys, he understood that integral to the good life was an appreciation of good food. But when is that appreciation most intense? Context is critical. Oysters are better with white wine and both are better in a sea-side café amongst old friends. A recent study shows how another contextual factor—ritual—plays a key role in our enjoyment of good food. The more we ritualized our consumption, the more we’ll relish the experience.

University of Minnesota Marketing Professor Kathleen Vohs and colleagues tested people’s self-reported enjoyment of a variety of foods including chocolate bars, lemonade, and carrots. Prior to consuming the food, some of the participants engaged in a series of deliberate, strictly sequenced (in other words, ritualized) gestures. For example, before eating the chocolate bar, they had to break it in two,

unwrap one half and eat, then repeat with the other half. Or, they had to pour half a packet of lemonade mix into a cup, stir, wait 30 seconds, then add the other half, stir again, wait 30 seconds and then drink. Other participants simply consumed after pausing an amount of time equal to the other group’s pre-consumption ritual or they engaged in random gestures before consuming

Participants who ritualized their consumption reported significantly greater enjoyment of the food (even carrots!) and were found to actually consume the food more slowly (by nine seconds on average), apparently savoring the experience more deeply than the others. Two other findings were noteworthy. One, enjoyment was further amplified if a delay was imposed between the ritual and the consumption. Two, greater enjoyment was not found for participants who merely observed ritualized food intake, suggesting that it was the active involvement in ritual that heighted the positive experience.

The study indicates that ritual enhances experience by increasing one’s involvement and intrinsic interest in the experience. This in turn focuses attention and heightens sensory awareness, making wine fruiter, oysters saltier—and quite likely—voices more melodic, colors more vivid, and friends more valued. Hemingway climbed mountains and crossed continents—his clenched fist draining life of every precious drop. More ritual might allow us to do the same much closer to home. 

 VIA psychologytoday