Highlights
- In the UK, 12 million people suffer from compulsive overeating
- Men ate 30 percent more than the usual and are at greater risk for developing chronic diseases
- Focusing more on people than the food can help avoid overeating at social gatherings
Overeating at social gatherings Researchers have selected college going students who were of the same weight to participate in the study. The study was published in Frontiers in Nutrition.
A competition was held for these participants. They were given the choice of choosing between the two groups, that included, eating chicken wings with cheering spectators or eating the chicken wings with no spectators.
The prize given to the winners is a plastic medal. The competitors did not care about the prize but concentrated fully on the food and ate four times more than the normal intake.
Results showed that, men who had cheering spectators ate 30 percent more than usual than the one’s who did not have any spectators to cheer.
"Focus on your friends and not the food," suggests Brian Wansink, PhD, lead author, Director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab and author of Slim by Design.
Social gathering helps to interact with diverse individuals from various social and community groups for distinct purposes. Social gatherings can be celebrating various occasions, meetings, workplace gatherings, party’s, etc.
Overeating is consumption of excess amounts of food which often leads to obesity and may be regarded as eating disorder which usually happens during festivals or while on holidays.
Some signs and symptoms to look out for are:
- fatigue
- eating even when not hungry (binge eating)
- eating alone or rapidly
- depression or mood swings
Treat overeating with the following:
- To effectively dealing with feelings
- To eating comfortably in a wide variety of situations
- To manage situations like parties and Christmas
- To Sleeping well
- To manage stress
- To building up self-worth and
- Being able to say “no” to food when needed