Researchers have found novel ways of attempting to curb the crisp (chip) eater's portion sizes by adding 'stop' signs into a tube of potato snacks.
As some very well known advertising may have told you, once you start into a tube of potato snack, it's very difficult to stop. There are many reasons behind this, taste and the ingredients amongst them. The other factor appears to be that it is very hard to keep track of how much you have eaten, especially if you are watching a movie or the television. Researchers from Cornell's Food and Brand Lab served tubes of 'Lays Stackables', some of which contained chips dyed red at different spaced intervals and gave these to some students to munch on while they watched some videos. Unaware of why some of the chips were red, the students who were served
those tubes of chips still consumed about 50 percent less than
the students who had regular tubes of snack. This reduced the calories consumed by the study group by about 250 Kcals (or the same as a light breakfast).
If you ate snacks everyday and managed to make these savings, you could save yourself a whole days modest calories by the end of the week, that's almost 2 months worth of Kcals a year.
Brian Wanskin, Cornell Food and Brand Lab director, said "Very modest reductions in intake produced by environmental changes
can, when cumulated, lead to substantial weight loss, these studies could have major public health significance."
Wansink said further studies are needed among larger, more diverse
groups to determine in what context segmentation cues work, exactly why
they work and whether people will compensate for the reduction in food
intake by eating more later.
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