Eat in the Dark to Lose Weight, Say Scientists

Turning the lights out or wearing a blindfold while eating could be a quick way to lose weight, according to scientists.

The simple trick works because it stops diners eating for pleasure rather than for calories. It also triggers a part of the brain that is worried that unseen food may be rotten without visual clues to show it is fresh.

An experiment by the University of Konstanz, in Germany, found that people who were blindfolded consumed nine per cent fewer calories before they felt full, compared to those who could see.

They also vastly overestimated how much they had eaten because they could not see how much was left on the plate. Blindfolded volunteers estimated they had eaten 88 per cent more than they actually had.

Scientists believe that not seeing food on the table also allows the body to know when it is full in real-time rather than remembering past experiences where it might have taken a full plate to feel satiated.

It also prevents the ‘cephalic’ phase of digestion which is triggered by the sight of food, promoting salivation and the release of gastric juices and so makes food, literally, less easy to swallow.

Lead author Dr Britta Renner said: “Visual deprivation caused a pronounced dissociation between actual and perceived intake.

“This may provide an unobtrusive and naturalistic means to change the experience of eating behaviour.

“These results might indicate that vision deprivation increases perceived intake because the estimation of the satiating potential of foods depends more on ‘real-time’ experience than on prior expectations.”

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