According to a study conducted by food psychologists Aner Tal and Brian Wansink, from Cornell University, when we go to the supermarket, the contents of our shopping cart depend on how many hours we have not eaten . Specifically, if we go on an empty stomach, we buy more foods rich in calories.
In their research, reported in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine , the scientists worked in the laboratory with 68 people of different ages who had not eaten for 5 hours, that is, the equivalent of skipping one of the five meals of the day. Next, half ate crackers until they were full. When they were invited to make the purchase of the week in a virtual store, they all bought the same number of low-calorie foods (such as fruits and chicken), but the hungry filled the shopping cart more with red meat, snacks and other products high in calories.
In a second experimental experiment, Tal and Wansink analyzed the actual purchases made by almost a hundred subjects at different times of the day: from 1 to 4 in the afternoon and from 4 to 7 in the afternoon . In the latter time frame, consumers tended to have more appetites and tended to buy more caloric foods than when shopping was made at noon, the scientists concluded.
