Kathy writes: “The claims for intuitive eating—that I can eat whatever my body craves and eventually lose weight—sounds too good to be true. However, the book I’m reading is very convincing. What’s your take?”
I think a lot depends on how you define “intuitive eating.”
What Is Intuitive Eating?
Tracy Tylka is a psychologist on the faculty of Ohio State University. She and her colleagues have developed and refined something they call the Intuitive Eating Scale, which assesses things like how much you rely on internal hunger and satiety clues to decide when to eat (and when to stop) as well as your tendency to eat for emotional rather than physical reasons.
Numerous studies have shown that people who score higher on the Intuitive Eating Scale are less likely to be overweight and more likely to be happy with their bodies and their lives in general. Being self-aware and mindful really can help us make better choices about food.
However, some people have taken this idea of intuitive eating much further, arguing that that the body knows what it needs and that cravings for foods are a signal that our bodies need nutrients found in these foods. The implication is that if we can just become sufficiently attuned to our bodies, we can eat whatever we desire because we will only desire what we need.
I’m not so sure.
Do We Crave the Food We Need?
An appetite for a certain food could sometimes be due in part to a need for certain nutrients. But cravings are not a very reliable guide to our nutritional needs. People suffering from iron deficiency frequently have an irresistible desire to chew on ice cubes, for example. Ice, however, does not contain a substantial amount of iron.
I think this theory also dangerously discounts how powerfully our desires and appetites are affected by environmental and psychological cues. Intense cravings can be triggered when we see images of appetizing foods or a delicious aroma wafts across our path—even if we aren't’t remotely hungry the moment before these triggers appear. Cinnabon isn’t pumping that cinnamon roll fragrance into the mall by accident, you know.
We can also become conditioned by habit. When my family goes to the beach, we always enjoy a frozen custard from Kohr Brothers (which is the best frozen custard in the world). I don’t think a whole lot about frozen custard when I’m not at the beach but I start craving it the minute I see the boardwalk—and probably not because I’ve suddenly developed a calcium deficiency.
Relying on our cravings to guide our food choices also implies that we should make all of our food choices in the moment. And yet studies have shown that deciding what we’re going to eat several hours before we eat it leads to better choices.
Can We Trust Our Hunger?
Some proponents of intuitive eating also promise that being sufficiently attuned to our body’s hunger and satiety signals will prevent us from overeating. Here again, although I think it’s really valuable to cultivate more awareness of our physical hunger signals, I’m not sure it’s a good idea to count on these signals alone.
See also: How to Know if You’re Really Hungry
Brian Wansink and his colleagues at Cornell University have demonstrated that how much we eat before we feel “full” is strongly affected by things like how big our plates and utensils are, how much food is on the platter that we serve ourselves from, and how much the people around us are eating.
And, as Mark Shatzker argues in his recent book, The Dorito Effect, we’re also surrounded by highly processed foods that have been deliberately engineered to trick us into craving—and overeating—things that are definitely not fulfilling our nutrient needs.
How Intuitive Eating Fits In
I think there’s definitely a place for intuitive eating. Developing self-awareness about your physical and emotional state and cultivating mindful eating habits can greatly enhance the quality of your diet as well as your enjoyment of the foods you eat.
I talked about mindful eating in my interview with sensory scientist Annette Hottenstein and here is a list of recommended books on mindful eating.
But in the world we live in today, mindful or intuitive eating probably is not enough to keep us out of trouble. I don’t think we can rely entirely on will power either. Most of us will benefit by employing a variety of other cognitive and behavioral strategies, such as these I’ve outlined in previous episodes:
- Keep tempting foods out of sight and healthy options front and center (See also: How to control overeating)
- Avoid eating while watching TV or working at the computer (See also: How to survive an unsupportive environment)
- Choose foods that deliver more satisfaction for fewer calories (See also: Satiety and Satiation)
- Use smaller dinner plates and avoid bringing serving bowls or food containers to the table (See also: Why we overeat)
- Plan your meals and do the grocery shopping when you’re not hungry or stressed (See also: The power of planning)
- Focus on foods you’d like to eat more of rather than foods you’re trying to avoid (See also: Shift your focus to make dieting easier.)
Additional Resources
30-Day Nutrition Upgrade Program
Image courtesy of Shutterstock.
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