Satiation is described as the process that leads to the termination of eating and therefore controls meal size.
Understanding some of the factors that impact and influence satiation can help to decrease overall consumption. So, if you are someone currently working towards a fat loss goal, having an understanding of how to manipulate your food and/or eating environment to increase feelings of satiation is going to be very helpful, especially if/when calories become lower and harder to adhere to.
Let’s look at 3 factors that influence satiation;
- Distractions
If you’ve been following me for a while, you’re probably sick to death of me harping on about the importance of mindful eating and eating without distractions. If you’re new here, check out this article on how you can support weight loss by eating mindfully.
Let me give you an example of just how impactful eating distraction free can be when it comes to satiation;
A 2006 study looked at two groups of over 80 women. In 1 experiment, they were required to consume a fixed portion of jaffa cakes at regular intervals, over a 5 minute period. In experiment 2, the second group of women were instructed to do exactly the same, the only difference being that they were also performing a highly engaging cognitive task. In both experiments, measures of hunger, fullness and desire to eat were taken before and after eating.
Despite both groups of women having similar baseline hunger levels, the non distracted women reported a significantly greater increase in fullness and a significantly greater reduction in desire to eat than those performing the cognitive task.
In a real life setting, it’s logical to presume that the non distracted females would have stopped eating their meal sooner due to feeling more satiated and would be less inclined to snack unnecessarily between meals.
Based on this, hopefully you can see just how detrimental eating in front of the TV or whilst working could be when it comes to portion control and therefore, meal size.
2. Eating Rate and Oral Processing
The rate at which you eat and the time needed to form a ready to swallow ball of food in the mouth (oral processing), defined by the number of and effort it takes to chew food, directly impacts portion size.
The oral processing (chewing) needed to make a ball of food ready to swallow takes longer for hard structured food (most fruits, vegetables and lean proteins) than soft structured food (mashed potato, cakes, pasta). Therefore hard foods induce higher oral processing exposure, are eaten at a slower rate than soft foods which results in smaller meal sizes of hard foods.
In 2011, a study on normal weight healthy men compared the intake of tomato soup in two different conditions; long exposure and short exposure time. The results indicate that the shorter exposure time resulted in a 34% greater intake of tomato soup compared to the long exposure time. In addition, a shorter exposure time delayed changes in ratings of hunger and fullness during intake and hence, delayed feelings of satiation.
My tip? Slow down and chew each mouthful thoroughly. You’ll enjoy your meal more and likely feel fuller and more satiated quicker. Oh, and remove all distractions!
3. Viscosity
Finally, viscosity; a bit of niche one really but interesting all the same!
A study in 2016 compared feelings of fullness and satiation after consuming shakes of different thicknesses as well as calorie amounts. The findings showed that those who consumed a 100 calorie thick shake reported higher levels of fullness compared to those who consumed a 500 calorie thin shake, indicating that feelings of fullness and satiation can occur irrespective of a foods caloric content.
Feelings of perceived fullness that is solely due to an increased viscosity is a phenomenon referred to as “phantom fullness” and may be useful in lowering energy intake. Further, this study’s results undermine the satiating impact of empty calories in drinks such as diet coke which are often used to promote fullness.
These are just three factors that have been shown to influence satiety and therefore portion size and overall food consumption, there are many more that I’d love to dive into at a later date but for now, hopefully this was insightful and gives you a few things you might be able to action.
