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The New Fat Hazard
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New research finds overeating is linked to positive personality traits-like being unusually engaged with the world. Susan B. Roberts on the surprising collision of personality and willpower.
Tell me if this sounds familiar.
You had lunch only a while ago, but at the café where you go to get a cup of coffee to help you feel less stuffed, there’s a huge chocolate chip cookie with your name on it, and you can't resist. Later, you go out to dinner and end up having two glasses of wine—and half a basket of bread—before even getting started on an entree. The next morning, you wish you had resisted, but as your day gets moving the rollercoaster starts again.
This scenario is a symptom of an incredibly common problem called “disinhibited eating.” As a group, disinhibited eaters are people who are unusually tied into the world around them and, when it comes to food, are more vulnerable to the everyday temptations of the high-fat, high-calorie goodies that surround us than those lucky folks to whom a full table is just a full table.
Surrounding yourself with a personal microenvironment that decreases opportunities for disinhibition creates a hunger-free, more-satisfied metabolism.
Disinhibited eaters frequently struggle with their weight, often gaining 40 pounds or more between the ages of 20 and 50. For these people, more than other folks, learning how to deal with our toxic food environment makes a world of difference. And by this, I mean learning how to comfortably control it rather than engage in futile battles of willpower with it. If you’re someone who tends to eat just because there is food for the taking, even if you’re not the least bit hungry, read on.
The scientific evidence for the importance of the food environment in weight control is compelling. More than a century of research and a Nobel Prize (given to Ivan Pavlov in 1904) tell us that our food environment has a major influence not only on what we eat, but also on our metabolism, hunger, and fullness. That’s because we actually have two separate systems for controlling what we eat. The first is an internal body-to-brain system that sends out signals if we need more calories. But just planning to eat the right stuff isn’t enough, because we also have a second, external system that channels signals to our brain that are triggered by the sight and smell of food in our immediate environment. What this means is that the environment has a handy control lever in our brain and body, telling most of us—but especially disinhibited eaters—that we should eat even when we don’t need to.
When a disinhibited eater (and I count myself very firmly in that group) looks at a juicy steak or a warm brownie, our eyes and nose signal our brain to activate a whole constellation of metabolic changes that control our hunger, our desire and need for food, and even how large or small our stomach is (and therefore how much food we need to put in it to feel full). Which is why, when you order Chinese takeout containing twice as many calories as you need, you need to eat most of it just to feel adequately full. The reverse is also true: We are actually less hungry and have a smaller stomach that gets full more easily when food is scarce.
Why on earth should we have two systems controlling what we eat? The need for an internal system is obvious: When our body is running short of fuel, our brain needs to know about it and push us toward the nearest deli. But an external system as well? We can only speculate, but needing to eat more food when more was available was probably an efficient survival strategy in times before an industrialized food system made food available at all times. Viewed through this perspective, disinhibited eaters are not doing anything abnormal. They are simply especially clued into what is going on around them, and therefore need to also be clued in to how to prevent these urges.
Disinhibited eating is usually also unhealthy eating. When our external control system prods us to eat, it often pushes us toward high-calorie, carb-and-fat-laden goodies that reward us with dopamine and other addiction chemicals. You do get satisfied eventually, but have to gobble down food in huge amounts before the fix of edible tranquilizers and stomach distention feels like enough.
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Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
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Disinhibited? Whaa?? What is that word supposed to suggest? Why would I have less "inhibition" at a coffee shop than in my kitchen? i just don't get this concept at all.
And I think the writer is dead wrong about toppings. Personally, I can resist parmesan cheese and sprinkles absent something to put them on, but I read recently, in an article that made MUCH more sense to me than this one, that condiments (similar to toppings) make people eat more because they make stuff tase better. Now that's a concept that makes a whole lot of sense. I love french fries dipped in ketchup. If I eat them plain, I will no doubt eat less.
"Create a more harmonious atmosphere when you eat out." What the WHAT? When I eat out, I am in a restaurant or a friend's house and, by definition, not in control; of the environment unless I want to be a very annoying guest! ..... And yes, when the lid is off the container of ice cream, I can eat more of it than when the lid is on. (???!!!)
I have also seen advice recently, which makes much mroe sense to me, that having a variety of foods to choose from makes you (me, whoever) eat more, not less. That makes sense. If there's a lot to choose from, you want to taste some of each thing. Duh!
Really, could I write an article about successful dieting please? I have been steadily losing weight winch the new year by counting calories. And I don't need to invest specious concepts like "disinhibited" eating. Sheesh!
What is this woman talking about? Seriously.
I totally know what this woman is talking about. Not specifically the toppings, but the controlling the environment. It is easy to control your environment even when you are out, you don't have to be obnoxious about it. For instance, a group of friends I play cards with always has m&ms on the table. But just asking to shift them to the other side of the card table puts them just enough out of reach. Everyone chuckles, but nods in understanding.
Another thing I would suggest is always having a water glass. I find that half of the eating when not hungry is just that it is something to do with your hands during conversations or even while watching tv. If the water is closer than the food, I go for that instead. It wont battle huge urges, but can help.
The ice cream lid thing also makes sense if you think of it more as the option of eating a predetermined amount out of a bowl vs eating out of the carton. It is easy to keep going until you hit the bottom of the container, so it is better if the container is essentially smaller. Or, like my boyfriend who never brings the TV snacks over to the couch. He gets up, goes to the kitchen, grabs a handful and comes back. You end up eating a ton less then if you can just keep eating what's in front of you.
Sounds like a hot steaming pile of Psycho Babble B.S.
" Surrounding yourself with a personal microenvironment that decreases opportunities for disinhibition creates a hunger-free, more-satisfied metabolism. "
How about this for a theory:
Surrounding yourself with bags of Nachos and Chips
decreases the opportunities for inhibiting Lard Ass.
" New research finds overeating is linked to positive personality traits-like being unusually engaged with the world. "
Please, is there any common sense left in this country anymore ?
If obese people were that engaged with the world,
they wouldn't have all that free time to overeat.
How about engaging with a treadmill ?
Why does everything have to be rationalized, excused if you will ?
The only reason there are diet books is because
we have become a country of fatties who
keep "diet experts" in business.
How many diet books existed before the current obesity problem,
before the 1970's, early 80's ?
re : [Disinhibited? Whaa?? What is that word supposed to suggest? Why would I have less "inhibition" at a coffee shop than in my kitchen? i just don't get this concept at all.] is sometimes referred to as monkey see, monkey do.
I think a person has to consider the gain and the loss when looking at chocolate chip cookies :). The utility of everything is calculable.
I think the the other thing is timing. In a restaurant, people often push you to buy something, and eat quickly, and it often takes 20 minutes to let the food hit your full button.
External Control System?
Isn't this all just an inability to recognize, and manage, food marketing?
It isn't an accident they put the cookies near the cash register. Selling things isn't just a game, it is a multi-billion dollar industry designed to get everyone (not just you) to buy something. The supermarket doesn't just randomly put some items at eye level, and some items at the ends of the aisles. They are trying to sell you stuff. Stuff that you may, or may not, need, or want. They don't care if you need it or want it, they make money only if they sell it.
Now, of course, there will be people who are, for whatever reason, far less able to resist the pull.
This comment has been removed by The Daily Beast's editors.
I thought this was a very interesting premise, and I googled "disinhibited eater" and found this article: http://www.web-articles.info/e/a/title/Willpower-Is-Only-One-Part-of-the-An swer/
The part about flexible restraint is worth reading if you're into this.
I think I'll probably continue to research this topic--thanks for the article.
what's left out of this story is the relative strength: do i want to be overweight and more subject to disease, or do i want to exercise, eat reasonably, and become relatively more healthy. in other words, people need to stop complaining and start to use the 'adult' portion of the brain, which says (or should say), "i've been here, done that, so i need to change my habits and control my self-destructive behavior."
Health has almost nothing to do with weight (unless you are grotesquely, GROSSLY over- or underweight). It has far more to do with your activity level. So stop being a self-satisfied sheep who believes all that diet-industry-fueled folderol about those OH-SO-FATAL (and even more fictitious) connections between weight and disease. But feel free to enjoy your all-American yo-yo dieting. Me, I'll enjoy the chocolate-chip cookies AND my endorphin-raising workouts, thanks kindly.
There are at least two premises at work here, but let me address the one about willpower:
If an individual has a problem with an addictive behavior, it's a personal problem and is best treated as such.
When a society has a problem with an addictive behavior (and as the obesity rate approaches 30%, it clearly does), then there's something wrong with how the society is approaching the problem.
In other words, de facto, since it's a societal problem, it's a societal problem. The long term success rate on diets is even worse than quitting smoking.
Sugar, salt, sugar, salt. It doesn't matter what you do or where you go -- if you're in a culture that saturates everything with sugar and salt, you're screwed.
Get off the processed food trap and then you'll know where you really are.
On planet earth, not wanting to eat yourself off of it.
The headline is stupid. I see nothing in this article about fun people being fatter.
And, its not true. I know fun skinny people and not fun bigger people.
Rush for example. He doesn't seem like he would be very much fun to hang out with ;)
A big snarling monster ;)
I think it's a little disconcerting that some of these commenters are so smug. This article makes a world of sense to people who experience this type of compulsion, of which I am one. I work out 6 days most weeks and have a finely honed eating and grocery shopping routine, but when I get out of that routine I can be completely uninhibited. I will eat things just because they're there, and I have to remind myself that this isn't the last cookie I'll ever see. I lost 10 pounds (135 to 125) over three months because I was so busy and stressed out with school and work that I stopped going out. It's pretty clear that I only overeat in social situations.
That might not be the case for everyone, but it's pretty ignorant to write people off as fat and stupid or smart and thin. Food issues are on a vast spectrum, and like everything else in life, what works for you might not work for other people.
Our society is not supportive of healthy eating. Rather than being helpful by offering healthy foods at social gatherings, the person who struggles with overeating is told "just resist" the high calorie fat laden food. If they don't, they are labeled out of control etc. etc.
Would you put an alcoholic drink in front of a recovering alcoholic and say "just resist"? I don't think so. So maybe some compassion is in order. You have not walked in the shoes of the disinhibited eater.
Thank you.
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