Do Food Cravings Raise Powerful Images in Your Mind?

May 28, 2010 in Food and the Brain, Weight Management by Joyce Bunderson

Frankly I must admit that I don’t think that I’ve really been a victim of powerful food cravings, with one exception. Certainly, I get the ‘munchies’ or the ‘nibbles’ and I’m launched on a quest for something to fill that empty space (physical or emotional) – but generally it is a quest where just about anything will suffice. I’ve usually defined it as hunger or just emotional eating. One year when we traveled through Italy, I had gelato every evening after dinner; but I don’t think I actually craved gelato. But I do remember when I was pregnant with my first child, over 40 years ago, having an intense desire to have a ‘Big Stick’ popsicle. This particular confection was a bit sherbety, smooth and, of course, icy cold. It was the only time during my three pregnancies that I had this ‘craving’ issue. It was the specific nature of this craving that is most interesting – I knew precisely and exactly what I wanted – it was almost a ‘compulsion.’ It never happened before, or again. Today I’m a little grateful for that experience, so long ago; I’m grateful because I feel that I had that little window of experience that helps me understand how powerful and specific food cravings must feel. I must admit that I’m glad that I haven’t had it throughout my life. There are certainly enough challenging eating situations without adding ‘cravings.’

I may sound like I’m making light of my craving experience, but in reality, craving can provoke binge-eating, obesity and eating disorders, and lead to feelings of guilt and humiliation, and therefore is a serious concern. I’ve discovered some research on it, and would like to share it with you.

Two women researchers, Eva Kemps and Marika Tiggemann at Flinders University, Australia have done some excellent research on food cravings and published it in the April 2010 issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. There is evidence from previous research that women are more prone to emotional food cravings than men, and these women researchers have shed light on how to cope with it.

Craving is different from hunger in that it is very specific – in craving; we know very exactly what we want to eat. Researchers have suggested that mental imagery may be a key component in food cravings; also, mental imagery takes up cognitive resources (thinking power). They have learned that subjects trying to complete a task, who are imagining something compelling to them, but unrelated to the task have a very difficult time completing those tasks that require greater cognitive resources. For example, the otherwise adequate ability to solve a math problem is greatly impaired while involved in imagining a chocolate bar.

The new researchers are so clever; while building on the prior research their new findings suggest that this cognitive limitation may work in reverse. Here is what I mean by working in reverse. They tried to learn if doing cognitive tasks could reduce food cravings. One of the experiments that they did was to ask the volunteers who were craving a food to form images of a common sight like a rainbow, or the smell of eucalyptus. Sure enough, it reduced the craving. They also did some experiments with a flickering pattern of dots on a monitor and reported a decrease in the clarity of the craved-food images. In addition, concentrating on the dots led to a reduction in the subjects’ food cravings.

It’s pretty exciting that the researchers may have learned a practical way to help the many of us who are plagued with food cravings. The researchers believe that their findings indicate, “Engaging in a simple visual task seems to hold real promise as a method for curbing food cravings.” The researchers seem to be moving to a next step, where some ‘visual noise’ display (like the flickering pattern of dots in their experiment) could be presented as an app on a hand-held computing device. They believe that the technology may also be helpful for reducing cravings for other substances such as drugs and alcohol.

Meanwhile, until their devices or apps (computing applications) are completed and available, maybe you could try to create your own diversion, if you struggle with cravings. It seems that it would logically have the best chance of working, if it were something that was easily accessed and engaged your thinking processes. Maybe a game or social network site or a novel - give it a try.