{"id":33967,"date":"2014-11-06T15:15:14","date_gmt":"2014-11-06T20:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dailyburn.com\/life\/?p=33967"},"modified":"2022-04-27T04:32:22","modified_gmt":"2022-04-27T08:32:22","slug":"30-second-trick-food-cravings-110614","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailyburn.com\/life\/health\/30-second-trick-food-cravings-110614\/","title":{"rendered":"The Trick That Might Stop Your Food Cravings"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Photo: Pond5<\/a><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

If you find it impossible to resist the 3 p.m. chocolate craving<\/a> that hits you every day, you\u2019ll be happy to know that you might be able to quash it \u2014\u00a0in just 30 seconds.<\/p>\n

Two new studies presented at The Obesity Society Annual Meeting<\/a> in Boston delved into ways to trick the brain into dismissing those junk food pangs.<\/p>\n

Because as much as you may try to rely on willpower<\/a> or mindfulness<\/a> to fight the munchies, sometimes there\u2019s nothing like a quick fix to hold you over until dinnertime (or dessert).<\/p>\n

Can You Tap Away Your Food Cravings?\u00a0<\/b><\/h3>\n

Walking around the block, popping a piece of gum into your mouth, chugging a glass of H20. You\u2019ve heard about these fixes<\/a>, and now we\u2019ve got another to add to your arsenal. In one recent study, researchers asked a group of obese patients to try three 30-second intervention tactics to reduce cravings<\/a>: Tapping their forehead, tapping their toe on the floor, or staring at a blank wall.<\/p>\n

The office snack stash can be brutally tempting \u2014 and you have to stare it down five days a week.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Researchers cued cravings by asking participants to imagine eating, smelling and tasting certain foods (try it: you can practically taste the cupcake you\u2019re envisioning, right?). Before and after the intervention, the study participants were asked to rate the intensity of their cravings on a scale of zero (low) to 100 (high). While each trick successfully reduced participants\u2019 longings, the most effective was forehead tapping (foot tapping ranked second).<\/p>\n

\u201c[These interventions] were dynamic, that is, they included movement, which engages more regions of the brain<\/a> than staring at a blank wall,\u201d says study author Richard Weil, director of the New York Obesity Research Center Weight Loss Program at St. Luke’s Roosevelt Hospital Center in New York City. \u201cEngaging the motor cortex to create movement makes the task more complicated and so it requires more work in the brain, and thus, more distraction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not down for 30 seconds worth of banging out a beat on your forehead? Weil says previous research has indicated that tapping for just 10 seconds might help to some degree, too.<\/p>\n

Battling the Munchies, Mentally<\/b><\/h3>\n

Thumping your foot: Pretty easy. Drumming your forehead: A little weird. But what if we told you there was a way to subdue hankerings in one minute \u2014 just by thinking?<\/p>\n

Another study this week found that sometimes the best way to beat cravings is by tweaking your mindset. Researchers from Brown University used MRI scans to examine the brain activity of obese or overweight study participants as they looked at pictures of drool-worthy foods like pizza<\/a>, French fries and ice cream<\/a>. The researchers then tested a few different strategies, encouraging participants to focus on them for about a minute at a time. In a series of tests, they told them to:<\/p>\n