Interesting article today in the Globe & Mail, which reports on a study that describes how we sabotage ourselves with portions.

More specifically, it comes down to the fact that if there is food put in front of us, we’re going to eat it no matter what it is. A study with differing sizes of snack bowls at a Superbowl party showed that the larger the bowl, the more likely we are to serve ourselves large portions — but the more interesting result is one I think we’re all familiar with:

Another study, conducted at a Chicago movie theatre, showed that people will even eat food that’s not very good if it’s in front of them.

Moviegoers at a movie were given buckets of popcorn — either freshly popped, or five-day-old rancid popcorn.

“When people ate it, it didn’t even crunch, it sort of squeaked,” he said as he described the old popcorn, eliciting groans and laughter from his audience.

Much of the fresh popcorn was quickly gobbled up before the credits finished running before the movie, he said.

As for the recipients of the old popcorn, they would taste it, put it down, wait a few minutes, then try again.

“By the end of the movie, they’re still nibbling away at this, and wincing every time they have a bite,” he said.

Anyone who has looked down at their popcorn bag, or indeed their popcorn bowl at home, and realized that it’s almost empty before the previews are over will probably recognize this.

What’s interesting from my own experience is that living alone makes this both better and worse. Food that’s within sight and reach gets devoured very quickly, particularly on quiet nights when there aren’t a whole lot of other distractions to get in the way, and so there are only two simple solutions to the problem:

1. Make sure that there’s no food within sight and/or reach, or
2. that the food you can see or get to is of the type that can only benefit you.

Wansink’s conclusions are based mostly around the vessels that we use, and that we can manipulate ourselves through using different dishes to serve food: Smaller plates, shallower glasses, and wider bowls can all diminish the calories per serving simply by merit of their capacity.

I wonder though if all of this couldn’t be harnessed the other way. Certainly we Canadians are being bombarded by the Five To Ten A Day message wheresoever the government can reach us, so could this not simply be paired up with that? If we have research showing that the mere availability of even rancid food will compel us to consume it, then why not use that to get us eating our recommended intake of the foods that are good for us?

After all, if people are willing to eat rotted popcorn rather than nothing at all, surely the same could be said for broccoli?