Curb Cravings with Easy Distractions

Hmmm, did you know that Obesity Week was Nov 2-7?  Neither did I. 

Some interesting tid bits from a few of the articles I read.  Each of the articles was discussing research studies that were presented at Obesity Week.

1.  Tapping your forehead for 30-seconds can help you avoid food cravings.  Actually they looked at tapping your forehead, tapping your ear, tapping your foot, and picturing a blank white wall.  Tapping your forehead just seemed to be the most effective out of all of these, perhaps because you could see your finger doing this action as well as feeling it.  So the researchers found that when their overweight or obese subjects were asked to think about one of their biggest food cravings, they were able to diminish these thoughts with the tapping action.  It seemed to interrupt the thought process.  Worth a shot if you're having a terrible time kicking the chocolate habit.

2.  Another strategy for avoiding cravings involved cognitive strategies.  The participants could picture "allow" (where they recognize it's okay to have the food, though they don't have to act on it immediately), "distract" (where they think about something other than the craved food), "later" (where they imagine what will happen down the road if they choose to eat this food), and "now" (where they visualize the reward of eating that food right now).  The researchers then used an MRI to see what brain patterns were initiated when these thoughts were used.  They found the most effect strategy was to use the "later" strategy as it stimulated the inhibitory portion of the brain the most.

3.  American's are now seeing a shift of how we view the epidemic of obesity.  Previously we had been more likely to push the blame onto the individual and now we are thinking that it is more of a community problem.  Not sure how I feel about this one.  While a lack of nutrition education and the fundamentals behind weight loss/gain/maintenance may be a community issue, it seems odd to suggest that the individual was an innocent victim/bystander.  With this sort of stance, how are we to improve the issue and educate the public?  Do we really want to take no responsibility for our own health and act as though it is the fault of our community?

4.  Finally, a study in Scotland showed that university students who had calorie labeling clearly displayed in their dining commons were more likely to make healthier (lower calorie) choices and less likely to gain weight.  College students are notorious for gaining that famous "Freshman 15".  What they found was that without encouraging the students to make particular food choices, the students commonly would make selections based upon the calorie labels and as a result showed less incidence of unintended weight gain.  We seem to be getting closer to this situation in the outside world, with at least some fast food restaurants clearly displaying the calorie content of their items.  If only all other restaurants got on board...  although, they'd probably find themselves out of business when customers realized that their "healthy" salad choice racked up around 1100 calories!

www.medscape.com