Studies on restaurant menus, hunger & cravings
Good morning everybody. It's Friday but we don't care. It's the next twenty four hours a day. That's what we do on this podcast. But the first thing we're gonna talk about today is a study on calorie labels on restaurant menus.
Speaker 1:Is this good? Is this bad? What are saying about that? Think about it. What do you think?
Speaker 1:Would you like to have calorie information and macros of food on all menus every time you eat out? Would you like to know how many calories you are consuming? What do you think? Think. Sit with it.
Speaker 1:Sit with it. Let's see what the study says. Purpose of the study was to see if using this information was related to basically weight management in a healthy way and just to see if it was helping people make better decisions. Okay. So it was seven eighty eight men and ten forty two gorgeous women aged 31 years old on average participated and they did loads of surveys questions to figure out okay asking them if they had noticed restaurant with calorie information.
Speaker 1:The results of this okay let's cut to the chase here 52.7%, of the participants reported they have noticed calorie information was purchasing a meal or snack in restaurants right. Amongst those that did thirty eight point two percent reported they did not use it to decide what to order but fifty percent said they used the calorie information to avoid high calorie foods or to decide on a smaller portion. The bad news in the study actually is that the concern is that the use of menu labels to limit calorie intake was most frequent among participants using unhealthy weight control behaviors compared with those only using healthy behaviors. So people who were they did the surveys are asking them to figure out if any of them were binge eaters food eating disorders. And, unfortunately, those are the ones that did were the ones using it for a calorie restriction, and then the ones who didn't have any disordered eating were actually not using the menus at all.
Speaker 1:So this raises the question, do we not show the information purely because people with eating disorders might use it to eat lower? And if if that's a good thing or not, it might be a trigger, it might it might not. Or is it the education side of things, like what is the answer there? It's an interesting study because for me I personally love to have all the information, calorie information, not because I'll get obsessed over it, not because I'd be like oh should I have this this is three eighty calories and this is three sixty and I get it. A lot of people who have got eating disorders and stuff will actually might be in terrible conflict in their mind about having what they want to eat because they wanna save 10 calories or 15 calories.
Speaker 1:There will be people who struggle with it. Right? So maybe restaurants need to offer a menu which does have calories and a menu which doesn't. Sometimes we do wanna see the calories. We just wanna go have a good time with our friends, eat the food, forget about it, it's gonna be heavy and calories cool.
Speaker 1:Some of us want to control to know. So the choice at the moment there is no choice but there is another side to the coin. Restaurants who do post the calories and macros of their foods, there's another knock on effect. They actually then create foods that are lower than calories in general because they don't want to see their menu with high calorie foods all over the shop. So it's a knock on effect on their behavior.
Speaker 1:The awareness of the restaurant of the calories and macros in their foods makes them aware. Therefore, they reduce the the use of these saturated fats and oils and all this stuff, bring the calories down on all their meals. That's a good thing. So, yes, the thing to what it's the thing to question. It's the thing to question.
Speaker 1:It's the same with tracking, right? Obviously, a turtle we say tracking, really useful tool. Good to know. Be your own scientist. For some people it's not not the right option.
Speaker 1:Okay? But the tracking is there, it's the availability of it there. Maury is frustrated and his restaurant will have no information on food and, I think the availability should be there personally. But let me know what you think about that. The next one I want to talk about is, hunger and cravings.
Speaker 1:Feeling hungry can mean at least two different things. Homeostatic, when you haven't eaten in several hours your stomach is starting to grumble and you're feeling these usual bodily sensations associated with hunger, it stems from your body's need for calories. Homeostatic hunger is driven by a complex series of signals throughout the body and brain that tell us we need food for fuel. The best way to get rid of this is to eat and maintain that full feeling for a healthy amount of time is to eat nutritious foods that fill you up. Okay?
Speaker 1:Classic, easy. Hedonic hunger. People don't just eat for calories because it signals their body for energy stores, they eat for pleasure. Of course we do. Foods such as ultra processed foods drive the brain to want more.
Speaker 1:Oh yes they do. Chocolate bar, get me some more of that. This type of hunger is called hedonic hunger. Hedonic, hedonic. Guys, look, I'm saying it how I say it, okay?
Speaker 1:Hedonic I can't say that word again. Hedonic hunger is wanting to eat, dwell on food or maybe craving something. Okay. So we got a hunger continuum. So we got homeostatic hunger into hedonic hunger.
Speaker 1:So homeostatic is when you're actually hungry, haven't eaten in, you know, what on one side is like you haven't eaten in hours and hours and hours and hours, you need the calories. And then the other one is when you just had a full meal but you were still want dessert, eaten for pleasure. A person who hasn't eaten in twelve or more hours is experiencing homeostatic hunger, whereas a person who wants to eat dessert, hedonic. Okay. So cravings.
Speaker 1:Let's we need to know what the definitions of words are. I can't throw the same craving out when you're actually hungry. Are you hungry? Be saying it's a craving. Okay.
Speaker 1:It's important that we don't mix these up. A craving is an intense urge to consume a particular food and this urge can occur regardless of how hungry or full you are. Research does not support the claim that certain foods are crave because the body lacks nutrients found in this food. Cravings are due to an unconscious expectation or conscious expectation of what is consumed in certain situations based on what we usually do. So how cravings happen?
Speaker 1:The thought of the food appease in the mind. When you're trying not to eat, your awareness of hunger may grow and the thoughts of food become more intense. Imagining and visualizing foods plays a strong role in cravings that even asking people to picture a food can trigger a craving. Crisps, oh, amazing crisps. Chocolate, oh, amazing chocolate, oh, that gooey cookie, oh, French toast.
Speaker 1:How about cinnamon bun, hot chocolate, am I am I setting any of you off? Because if I am, let's calm it back down. You just took you just you look, it's gone in your mind. You can bring it back down. So it's a craving.
Speaker 1:It's not real. Well, it is, but I've triggered it. Be there's no you're not hungry for it. Okay. There's difference.
Speaker 1:Let let it go. Accept it, but let it go. Cravings and expectations. Suppose you usually eat a particular food in a specific situation, popcorn in front of the TV, you are subconsciously beginning to form expectation that that this situation and the consumption of this particular food occur together. I sit down therefore I have popcorn, expectation is TV popcorn, let's go Cobra Kai season four.
Speaker 1:Is that what I'm saying? Is that what I'm saying? It's brown with the brain. Okay? That's what it's doing, the brain.
Speaker 1:So what we can do control based strategies, steering thoughts or attention somewhere else or changing the content of thoughts so that the food is no longer attractive. So an example is distraction is you're playing Tetris on the phone for five minutes or solving word puzzles. Yeah, that's a distraction. Negative thoughts, thinking of the food as ruined. For example, imagining that someone has sneezed on it, was dropped on the floor and it smells out of date.
Speaker 1:Oh, no. It's disgusting. Or just think back to someone you really dislike eating and thinking it's the best food in the world therefore you now dislike it. Okay, so acceptance based strategies. Turning attention to thoughts, feelings and physical sensations and accepting them as transient states.
Speaker 1:It is a relatively new, more time consuming and more research is needed. But this is what I'm saying is the this is it. Okay? Through training, you learn the thoughts and crave and you do not need to escape from what change, but you also do not have to take them as truths. You simply must act on.
Speaker 1:Think of like six hands around you putting with different food outreached to you and you're just sitting in the middle and like a little yoga pose and the six of them and you're going, please take this cookie, you take this bread, take that. Okay? And you just can just sit there and accept and be like, yeah, you know, and it's accepted that they're, you know, trying to, trying to bait you in. Close your eyes, you don't see them anymore. Block your nose, you can't smell them anymore.
Speaker 1:You know they're there but you don't accept that you have to act on it and you don't have to act. It's the conflict. It's the conflict that's the problem. And if this research, this new research, isn't gonna show anything and this has been, this is an Eastern thought for ages Buddhists and stuff think about this all the time. I think if you can look at a word without the meaning of the word, it has no more power over you.
Speaker 1:Because the words are loaded, and they say that, can you look at the fact without adding anything else to the fact? Can you just sit with the fact? Can you sit with the fact that you're craving something and not trying to escape that? Can you sit to the fact that you are hungry and that, you know, it's not escaping because you're not trying to escape it? Can you sit to the fact that you're a greedy git?
Speaker 1:Because we're all greedy as humans, but we're gonna try not be greedy. Therefore, we're fighting conflict again and again and again. So every time you have a craving, accept the fact you got a craving. Okay? The word craving has got a bit of a negative connotation to it.
Speaker 1:Accept this. Craving. You know what's happened. Let's listen. Let's look.
Speaker 1:You know, you know what's happened. Stimulus has caused it. You expect you're expecting it now. You're always gonna be nice if I have a sit with the facts that you have now got a craving and don't try and change it and stay with it. Therefore, the craving will lose its power over you.
Speaker 1:The research is showing this now and it's gonna show more, no doubt in my mind. You can understand? And I'm gonna finish with this. And this is going into the weekend, we're more aware. Right?
Speaker 1:The studies show the only intervention that works for weight loss with problem foods is being able to eat your problem foods in moderation. Nothing else worked, low calorie stuff, not buying it, your friends not buying it, you know, putting in the cupboards, hiding away like Tom McCabe says. None of that actually worked long term. The only thing that did was being able to live with our problem food and eat it in moderation. Therefore, I'm not being conflict with it.
Speaker 1:Therefore, it's not a problem food anymore. Does that make sense to you? There's a problem food, a chocolate bar. You're always fighting it all the time. Oh, don't bring it over later.
Speaker 1:Blah blah blah. Always fighting against it. But the only intervention of us is putting the table next to you, looking at it, and actually fighting it. And actually being able to eat it moderately. I know it's easier said than done, but there's no there's no conflict between you and the chocolate bars there.
Speaker 1:And actually, you can have a chocolate bar in your house and not crumble and eat it. Therefore, it's not a problem anymore because you and that bar, that chocolate bar, the food, this like big words we're using is gone. What do we think about that? The environment is not guaranteed. Your routine is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1:You will be knocked out of routine. You're gonna be knocked out of an environment that you that you thrive in, and you're gonna be put into the chaos. What do you do in the chaos is the question. Do you lack every skill going and can't deal with anything outside of routine, therefore crumble and break and just eat everything? Or can we learn the skills of being able to live in the chaos?
Speaker 1:Live with these different things, environmental cues and stuff like that. I think that's where we have to work on as well. So in an octagon challenge we're going back to habits. We'll be reading tiny habits by BJ Fogg as the first bug. We're gonna look at habits, we're gonna look at the psychology of it.
Speaker 1:We've got morning mindset with Dean, cup of tea in the morning, you know, half seven to half eight whatever drop in sessions. We've got performance well-being with Hugo Gilmore. And then we've got the mental health of Ryan Williams. We've got three different levels here. We've got the daily, the awareness with Dean in the mornings, the daily awareness bringing attention to the day ahead.
Speaker 1:Any questions offloading? We've got the performance well-being with Hugh. How do we take ourselves to the next level? How do deal with stress? How do stresses and hold us back?
Speaker 1:And we've the mental health stuff, which is very important. Like on Book Club last night, opening up, we talk about anxiety. The word anxiety is very loaded. All these words, all these thoughts about mental health and behind stuff and realizing that all of us go through and we all have anxiety. Every human has anxiety.
Speaker 1:Every human has fears. Every human has anxiety. Every human has sorrow and sadness and grief, we go through it, all of us. Universal sort of competition, but we don't talk about it. So that's where the mental health stuff comes in, it's being able to have this open forum and being able to chat about it.
Speaker 1:So I'm looking forward to kind of bringing us all together. We're gonna have the habit side, psychological side, you know, the general mindset performance, the mental health. We're gonna really attack this thing in a full prong approach. Yeah. And the nutrition side is gonna be an educational seminar forum, a very interactive, and again that's about behaviors and stuff as well.
Speaker 1:Eating is a lot about behaviors that why do why do we want to eat it? What's the why behind the eating? Why do I want that chocolate bar? You know, and it's less we know it's not acting like animals and just snatching, ah. Okay.
Speaker 1:Well, that's right by now because it's nice. Okay. Let's go a bit deeper than that. Let's delete judgment for a second. You know what I'm saying?
Speaker 1:So we're really gonna go into this in much more depth than Octagon one. Octagon one was good, but this is gonna blow its head off. But we're going into the weekend. Okay? Weekend is a normal it's another day.
Speaker 1:Saturday, but it's another twenty four hours. Right? Try and live in the moment. Be present. See what's in front of you.
Speaker 1:See what is. You know, try not to let yourself fight this and that. Okay? Don't make foods a big deal more than big deals than they are. Chalk is bad, junk food, big names, and fighting against that.
Speaker 1:Right? If you do eat something like a cookie, accept it. You've eaten a cookie. There we go. Okay?
Speaker 1:It's done. You've eaten it. There's no more fighting after that feeling bad about it. I know it's easier said than done. We have to stop doing this.
Speaker 1:We have to just accept. Accepting facts and working from the facts is the important thing. The fact is you ate the cookie. Now what? Okay.
Speaker 1:You accept. Move on. K. Steps in. Whatever.
Speaker 1:Enjoy yourself. Don't beat yourself up. And we got weekends are crucial. Weekends are crucial to understanding why your behavior drastically changes from the weekday to the weekend. If you're one of those people, why does that happen?
Speaker 1:Let's start inquiring about these things. Why is it that weekends cause us to act in a completely different essentially irrational way versus a weekday? You know, I read a book on capitalism. Yeah? And it was talking about the weekends.
Speaker 1:And the weekends are basically the weekends we got today are a capitalist creation in the sense that they know that they could fill weekends with pleasurable things for us to do. We would spend money and we go around and around and we would get pumped for weekends, spend money. It's just another way to keep spending and consuming. You know, it makes sense. So the weekends came by and now we feel the urge we have to spend, we have to consume, we have to do something all the time on weekends.
Speaker 1:Okay. And it's about money eating out, like all this stuff. It's ingrained in us to make the most of weekends, which makes sense because we work in the week. But we must be able to make the most of every day no matter if it's filled with work, matter if it's filled with seeing friends. We have to be able to make the most of it no matter what.
Speaker 1:And when it comes to the weekends, we don't have to turn into wild animals and go big and crazy and eat all the stuff and drink all everything and kind of change the complete course. There's a lot of, there's a lot of gains to be made by being able to be totally aware on the weekends. If we can be totally aware on the weekends, understanding our behaviors on the weekends and actually limiting those really extreme behaviors, huge amount of gains are going to be made. You'd be shocked at the amount of calories people over consume on weekends, putting them putting them back, putting them back in their fat loss journey by a lot. You know, they're in deficit of say 4,500 calorie deficit after five days, know, that could that's what happens and then two more days they've lost a pound of fat basically by going into 3,500 calories.
Speaker 1:But over the weekend they over consumed by 3,400 calories therefore knocking away. There's no more deficit. There's a slight surplus. Maintenance holds back to square one on Monday. Keeps going around because there's two or three decisions that happen in the weekend that were like, ah, fuck it.
Speaker 1:Fuck it. That's what happens. I'll have it all. I'll do up on this. And it's like, how are the other decisions?
Speaker 1:Always appear pressure, pushing you, things like this. And this just comes down to being aware. That's all I'm saying. So the weekends are coming. It's a good time.
Speaker 1:January is probably a bit easier because people tend to be chill. But do, do ask why this weekend about your actions and, and analyze them. And let me know what you think. Guys, enjoy yourself. It makes makes the most of today, obviously.
Speaker 1:And next week, the doors will be open for the group no. Actually, the week after of Octagon. So Octagon sale to you'll be able to join Octagon from Sunday onwards. So anyone that's not listening who's gonna join join up Sunday, you are a member, you'll be notified when to join the group. And if you've any friends who wanna join, happy days.
Speaker 1:For all Octagon people, you know, there's an affiliate scheme so you can can make money whilst helping someone with total health. How amazing is that? Information is in the group. But enjoy your day, get your one big thing done. I'll see you on Monday.
