How to End Portion Distortion, Eat Less, and Still Be Happy

Can you eat less and still be happy?

Imagine sitting down to a meal with a bunch of other people. They might be friends, co-workers, or strangers—it doesn't really matter. Platters of food are brought to the table and passed around. For the sake of argument, let's say the food is appealing but not "sell-your-grandma" amazing.

How much do you end up eating?

Overeating goes beyond blood sugar and appetite

If it's been several hours since you last ate, your stomach is probably empty. Your blood sugar is should be relatively low. Your level of ghrelin, a hormone that stimulates your appetite, may be on the rise. If, on the other hand, you have eaten recently, then your stomach might still have some food in it. Your blood sugar levels are likely to be moderately high, and your ghrelin levels, low.

Factors having nothing to do with hunger may have a lot more influence over how much you put on your plate.

You might think that your blood sugar and appetite hormones would play a significant role in determining how much you eat in this scenario. In reality, factors having nothing to do with hunger may have a lot more influence over how much you put on your plate.

• How big is your plate? Is it 8-9 inches across (which used to be standard) or is it closer to 12 inches in diameter, as is now typical?
• How much food is on the serving platter? Is there one piece of chicken for each person at the table or enough for everyone to have seconds or thirds?
• How big are the individual pieces on the platter? Is the lasagna cut into 3-inch squares or 5-inch squares?
• How much food has your neighbor put on their plate?

These factors have a lot more influence over how much you serve yourself and eat than you might suspect.

If you're like most folks, if given a larger plate than you usually use, you'll serve yourself more than you typically do. If there's more food on the platter, you'll put more on your plate, regardless of how hungry you are. We're social animals, so you'll also calibrate your serving to match what other people at the table have served themselves.

If there's more food on the platter, you'll put more on your plate, regardless of how hungry you are.

If, on the other hand, there's less food on the platter, the food is cut into smaller pieces, your plate is smaller, or the others at the table serve themselves smaller helpings, you'll probably end up with significantly less on your plate.

Either way, once the food is on your plate, you'll probably finish...

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