Eating Too Quickly – and Getting Fat

We recently posted a piece about the benefits of eating slowly; the data were gathered in a small study with an experimental design, but now a similar result has been obtained in a large epidemiologic cross-sectional study. Over 3,250 Japanese adults had their body mass index (BMI) measured and completed questionnaires about their eating habits over the previous month. The focus was on whether the subject ate until they felt full, and the speed with which they ate. The results of this study are published in the British Medical Journal. 

After adjustments were made for differing daily calorie intakes, it was found that those who reported eating until they were full were roughly twice as likely to be overweight compared with those who stopped eating sooner. And those who ate quickly were about twice as likely to be overweight as those who ate more slowly. The combination of eating until full and eating quickly was especially likely to be associated with being overweight.
This may all seem pretty obvious to those of us brought up on the stereotypic view of ‘Billy Bunter' or ‘Fat Albert'. Of course, fast foods and the reduced frequency of a family dinnertime play into this lifestyle - grab a quick meal and wolf it down. But, as shown in the experimental study referenced above, it may be possible to avoid weight gain by interfering with such eating behavior. My mother always chewed everything 32 times - "once for each tooth" she said. Maybe we should all try to set an example to the younger generation, who are indeed at risk.