Healthy Food Makes Consumers Feel Hungrier When Choices Are Limited

Bummer.

If we don't have a choice in the matter, eating something that's considered healthy might simply lead us to feel hungry and eat something else, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research.

Authors Stacey Finkelstein and Ayelet Fishbach (both University of Chicago) examined external controls in the domain of healthy eating -- such as marketers who only offer shoppers healthy food samples or consumers who eat healthy meals in a cafeteria that only offers healthy alternatives.

"In the presence of external controls, people who eat healthily feel that they have made sufficient progress on their health goals," the authors write. "Then, they switch to the conflicting goal to satisfy their appetite: they express hunger and seek food."...

"People who were given a food sample described as healthy rated they were hungrier than those who were given the same sample framed as tasty and delicious," the authors write. "Those who freely chose the food sample were equally hungry. Thus, only those who were given the healthy food sample (imposed consumption) became hungrier."

The answer?

Fat people want "unhealthy" food as a choice.

Well, you do not need to eat "healthy" foods to lose weight.

This is good news since:

a. There are no "healthy" foods and
b. Only the Calories you eat make a difference.

If you want to learn how to lose weight eating the foods you are currently eating, go here.

And to do it with "fast foods," go here.