Book Review: Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think by Brian Wansink, PhD

Posted In: Wellness December 13th, 2013 divider No Comments »

I got a hold of another great book recently: Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think by Brian Wansink, PhD.

It’s basically what science is telling us about how portion size, packaging and perception is telling us about how much we eat. I’m sure you’re shocked why I picked it up.

Once again it showed us that while many people are biased, most people don’t think they simply can’t be tricked by simple slight of eye tricks like packaging, colours and portion sizes, right? Yes they can! It was very telling in the many experiments they ran. They showed time and time again how we eat more than we think and most of the time we have no clue about how and why.

It’s also very hard for us to stop eating even if we feel full but there’s still food on our plates. They even ran an experiment where they gave stale popcorn to folks and they wolfed it down since it was free. Who doesn’t love free food?

One of the big trends over the past 50 years is that North Americans are eating out more and more. And the portion sides are getting bigger. And we’re programmed to finish our plates so that’s a bad combination. It also doesn’t help we’re not as active physically as we were…

Since we lead busy lives it’s hard to be mindful when you eat since most of the time you’re eating on the run. Do you pay attention to the bagel you’re wolfing down when you’re running late to work, a workout or dropping your kids off at their hockey practice?

This book has changed how I eat. I now take more time to chew and consciously enjoy the food. I also try to take smaller portions and use smaller plates. The great thing for me is that I’m more aware of what’s happening. Isn’t that we’re all striving to do?