why did I eat that?

It's getting dark at 4:30 these days, and I have found myself looking to eat dinner much earlier.  It's not that I'm actually hungry- most times I eat lunch around 1pm and eat a snack around 4pm.  So, why do I feel hungry?  Why do I want to eat dinner just after my snack?

We eat for many reasons.  Food is really just fuel for the body.  We eat because we have used up this fuel, and our body needs to have more.  But, in our society, food tends to be much more than simple fuel.  Food is social; food is emotional; food is yummy.  A problem arises when food becomes more emotional then physiological.

Some of the major contributors to why we decide to eat are know as external cues.  The external cue theory basically says that we eat because of external cues to our brain like:

• the smell of food (hunger you feel when you smell fresh bread)
• the time of day (you don't feel hungry until you look at the time and notice it's noon.  All the sudden you get hungry)
• the routine that we are in (dessert after dinner; popcorn at a movie)



Are you hungry for that popcorn or is it habit?

• the social environment (everyone is eating now- so I must eat now, too)

rather than internal cues such as: true hunger or low blood sugar.  I know that I fall into this trap of thinking that I'm hungry when I'm not truly hungry; it happens to everyone.