Science says: Fat people are making us fat

cheesyboy

cheesyboy

cheesyboy

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A team of psychologists, led by Mitsuru Shimizu at Southern Illinois University, found that people ate 31.6% more pasta and 43.5% less salad when in the company of an overweight person, irrespective of how healthy the overweight person’s food servings were.
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeands.../14/why-eating-with-other-people-makes-us-fat

There's the stats and facts, time to GD the mechanisms behind the results

So, why do we eat more around fat people? A few ideas for discussion:
- We're social creatures, we like to mimic our colleagues. Even overweight ones
- We feel sorry for overweight people, and want to help them fit in by normalising their diet. I'll have the cheesy chips. with extra cheese. and cheese dip.
- Fat people have a magic aura which drugs others into eating more
- We relax in our calorie controls when in the company of someone who makes us feel thin. We cut loose.
- We're subconsciously scared that the fat person will steal our food - we eat more as a primal defense mechanism in the expectation of a famine to come.
- Dining with a fat person means you are more likely to have your dining choices influenced by their preferences: they aren't likely to want to eat at Maggie's Vegan Salad Emporium, after all.
- Fat people eat loads: it throws our portion size compass out of alignment.
- Any other theory?

As a final thought, what happens when two fat people are eating together? Does the portion increase exponentially as they influence each others appetite ever upwards?
 
Most likely a combination of the more serious suggestions, but I'd put my money on this being one of the more significant ones (as I've witnessed larger people downsize portions when around thinner people).

- We relax in our calorie controls when in the company of someone who makes us feel thin. We cut loose.
 
So what you need to find is the ALPHA fatty- 'Fatty ZERO' and put a steak though their heart?

I think its BS.
 
cheesyboy said:
As a final thought, what happens when two fat people are eating together? Does the portion increase exponentially as they influence each others appetite ever upwards?
Click to expand...

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It's possible.
 
When in Rome...

I think it's a valid point, not that I care much. Eat your fill! Life is too short to order beansprouts and tofu for dinner.

It's like if I eat at my mums, she does MASSIVE portions, big old portions of food. She's not strictly fat but I can imagine eating at a fat persons house you'd get a big portion and feel inclined to finish lest ye be judged.

At home I do less and I use smaller plates (on the subject studies have shown smaller plates actually make us eat less, I didn't buy them for that but still) but I've been told my portions are big by some people. All women
 
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I'm not fat but I'm a very fast eater, I literally race when eating, particularly when it's good food. I've noticed the people who sit at the table with me eat faster due to my proximity, I even get complaints for it "Omg, I'm eating too fast because of you!". They may be on to something here..

As a final thought, what happens when two fat people are eating together? Does the portion increase exponentially as they influence each others appetite ever upwards?
Click to expand...

New black hole theory? :D
 
Fat people each bigger portions of food. I remember when i was growing up i had a fat friend called sergio and when i went to his house for dinner one time. His mom made so much pasta, like enough pasta for 3 meals and she kept putting more on the plate. I had one plate and that was enough but they ate 2 plates full. It was no longer a mystery why he was fat after meeting his fat mom and seeing how much food they ate.
 
The only thing making me fat is a lack of exercise. My brother and I will match each other portion for portion. But he burns it off with running and weight training. I sit on the couch feeling sorry for myself.
 
Just had a thought:

If being fat has the externality of making others fat (or at least eat more, which tends to lead to gaining weight), should being fat around others be equated, in terms of the effect on others' health, with smoking and the effects of passive smoking? It's not just yourself you're harming....

That's ^ more a philosophical point than a serious suggestion of policy, btw.
 
People eat more when with me because I eat a lot. I think there is some truth to that.

However if I am with "larger" people, whilst I may still eat a lot, my food choices tend to be more careful - furthermore, owing to keeping fit my metabolism can cope with the occasional blow out.

I also know some "larger" people that do not eat a lot and haven't got a big appetite, but I suspect they snack a lot, on probably less than sensible foods.

I think it's probably more about the social situation and you relaxing around those that eat more than you. However not many people can put away several thousand calories in one sitting easily.
 
If surrounded by people with 'larger appetites', you don't feel so bad to be eating so much. I definitely agree with that.

If out on lunch with some people from the office and they all order something small, I'd not want to order a big meal, even if I was hungry for it.
 
Which compulsion takes precedent? If you put a skinny person with a fat person would the fat person eat less or the skinny person eat more? Or would they meet in the middle.

Could the NHS invest in a buddy system?
 
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