Snack of Meal: Losing Weight Through Psychological Reframing

How we think about the food we eat is an important component in the multi-faceted problem that is obesity. Believe it or not, categorizing a food as a ‘snack’ or a ‘meal’ affects food consumption. Moreover  thinking differently about a food may influence how much we eat and how hungry or satiated we feel thereafter.

Capaldi, Owens and Privitera (2006) showed that the same food could be classified as a snack or a meal by different people, and how an individual categorized a food affected subsequent eating behaviour. The researchers pre-fed participants identical foods and found that those who categorized the food they recieved as a ‘snack’ ate more in the time following than those who interpreted the prefeeding as a ‘meal’. This was found to be the same regardless of whether the macro-nutrient composition of the meals were high protein or high carbohydrate.

There is no ‘SNACK’ …

One simple way to help kick start your weight loss plan without any hitches is toSTOP breaking down your day into three main meals and several ‘snack’ periods. Since snacks have a smaller satiety ratio and a greater energy density, cutting down on these extra foods between meals will help to reduce daily energy intake, added sugars, refined carbohydrates, etc. from our diet. Through years of psychological conditioning, we seem to instinctively ‘know’ that snacks are likely to be sugary or salty foods that will ‘reward’ rather than satiate. Recall, if you will, what your childhood self would consider a ‘snack’ coming home from school. I’m sure that many of you weren’t bridging the time between school and dinner with celery sticks and cottage cheese! Therefore, avoid the problematic associations we’ve all formed with the term ‘snack’ by re-framing each of your sit down eating periods as ‘meals’ … not only will your food choices likely improve, but the possibility of binge eating should similarly decrease.

Reference:

Capaldi, E. D., Owens, J. Q., & Privitera, G. J. (2006). Isocaloric meal and snack foods differentially affect eating behavior. Appetite, 46(2), 117–123.

Wadhera, D., & Capaldi, E. D. (2012). Categorization of foods as ‘snack’ and ‘meal’ by college students. Appetite, 58, 882-888.