Are you falling for these tricks?

I'm not going to lie. I'm eating like a horse. And I'm not exercising. And I'm gaining weight madly. In the best interest of staying positive, and helping you all keep fit and have fun (!) I'm just going to enclose an article that I thought was really helpful, and wish you all a great FIT week!!!

Tamara

What You See is What You Eat

By Erik on Dec 03, 2010 10:00 AM in Dieting & You

As we’ve talked about in the past, enormousserving sizes and the deeply-ingrainedmentality we have to “clean” our larger-than-average plates are some of the subconscious factors responsible for our overeating habits. New research shows that there are additional visual cues which affect our sense of hunger and likelihood to gorge. These subtle visual “tricks” used by restaurants and food manufacturers are leading us to buy (and eat) more and more without even realizing it. Have you fallen into these traps?

The Photo Says it All

Snack foods often show a representative sample photo prominently on the front of the packaging. For example, a box of cookies might show a photo of five cookies and a bag of pretzels might show an image with fifteen pretzels. A recent study found that the number of items shown in these product photos affects how we judge an appropriate serving size, how we evaluate the number of items in the entire package, and ultimately, how much we eat.

The study, published in October’s Journal of Consumer Psychology, showed that people given a package of cookies with more cookies shown on the front would assume there are more total cookies in the entire package and more in the appropriate serving size than those given the exact same package with fewer cookies shown in the photo. Since they assumed the serving size to be larger, the people given the package with a greater number of cookies shown ended up eating more.

Small, Medium, Large?

Another recent study in the similarly-named Journal of Consumer Research found that consumer behavior is greatly influenced by how manufacturers name their serving sizes, such as “small,” “medium,” and “large.”

In this study, testers were offered the exact same packages with different size labels. People offered a large item with a “small” label ate more than those given larger size labels. Additionally, it made these people feel less guilty about overindulging, an effect which the researchers call “guiltless gluttony.”

Hungry Colors

Finally, something as simple as the colors in a logo, product packaging, or on the walls of a restaurant can change the way we eat. Have you ever noticed that almost every fast-food franchise is decked out in bright reds and yellows? It should be no surprise that these colors attract our attention, make us excited, increase our heart rate, and stimulate hunger.

Your thoughts…

Have you been fooled into overeating with these visual tricks?