diAnna Fregonara
Anger forces us to look for crunchy foods, boredom forces us to nibble: compulsive eating is powerful because it activates the brain circuits of reward. Here’s how to change habits with mentally more “appetizing” alternatives
An instinctive drive that leads to the search for food and also determines the type of food we are attracted to: anger, for example, can favor the choice of crunchy textures while the boredom of nibbling between meals. This is nervous or emotional hunger.
The mechanism
«You feel it in response to difficult situations, when you have the greatest need for immediate relief, a sense of pleasure or reward, to be consoled: after an argument, a reproach from the boss, a moment of sadness», explains Daniela La Porta , psychologist and psychotherapist, author of the book «Hunger nervous» (Edizioni Lindau). «The uncontrolled need to eat sometimes assails at apparently random moments, other times at recurring and repetitive moments, such as every day when returning from work or at night, becoming a habit», she adds.
A habit is that action that you no longer have to think about to carry out and that you cannot do without, like tying your shoes for example. While about 95% of habits are helpful, the remaining 5% can be problematic, such as when you eat more or less than what is required to stay healthy. Most people say they can’t change because they don’t have the willpower. Yet if this were enough we would be able to tame nervous hunger attacks, stop smoking and so on.
Willpower is not enough, why?
Judson Brewer, an internationally renowned psychotherapist and neuroscientist who has spent decades studying how and why we form habits and what we can do to break them, dismantles this view of the predominant role of willpower. As he writes in his new book «Break nervous hunger» (Ed. Corbaccio), all approaches to getting back into shape have one element in common: duty. We should eat fewer calories, move more, choose better foods.
Each of us knows what a healthy lifestyle consists of, but this is often not enough to help us change our way of acting, with the aggravating circumstance that we feel guilty and perceive ourselves to be wrong for not having been able to give up extra sweet or sudden and uncontrolled binge. “Knowledge isn’t enough because that’s not where the change happens,” Brewer, who is also director of research and innovation at Brown University’s Mindfulness Center, told the Washington Post. According to the neuroscientist, we need to shift attention from the exclusive use of willpower, which rewards in the short term, to understanding the sensation, the awareness, because that is where the change in behavior takes place. To do this, however, we need to harness the power of the brain to break away from old habits and adopt new and more positive ones. But how to do it?
The most effective approach: awareness, but how?
«A more effective approach could be to combine willpower, therefore working on determination and motivation in the early stages of change to make a “turning point” in the behavior we wish to change, to the consolidation of long-term healthy habits, in this case by acting on awareness and the brain”, suggests Diego Sarracino, associate professor of models and clinical techniques of intervention and anxiety and mood disorders at the University of Milan-Bicocca. «As regards willpower, let’s remember that it is supported by practice and constant training. Eating mindfully, on the other hand, means using all the senses to achieve full awareness of the experience of food and what our body really communicates to us. Mindfulness, a fundamental skill for understanding oneself, others and the world around oneself, may be seen by some as a new age or “alternative” concept, while a growing number of scientific studies highlight its usefulness and benefits in promoting of well-being in the individual and in the community”.
How the brain thinks about “reward” food
To make the brain a friend, however, we must start by considering that our “decision maker” is the orbitofrontal cortex. Thanks to our caveman ancestors, it has only one rule: if A is more rewarding than B in terms of survival, when you have the possibility to choose you opt for A. This is why between an ice cream, which has more calories and calories means survival, or broccoli wins ice cream, to use Brewer’s example. «Today, however, the brain uses this learning process to trigger cravings, create habits that lead to compulsive behaviors. To change a habit it is necessary to update the reward value that the brain stores”, continues Sarracino. «The reward system is a complex brain circuit that regulates the motivation, pleasure and learning associated with rewarding experiences. When an individual experiences something pleasant, such as food, sex, physical activity, the reward system is activated, releasing dopamine, a neurotransmitter that causes feelings of reward and reinforces the behavior that led to the reward. Habits are formed through a stimulus-routine-reward cycle that involves the brain in creating specific neuronal connections which make behavior automatic and repetitive over time. An example of this cycle is: stimulus=bar, routine=drink coffee, reward=I feel more energized and active. The more times a person performs the same routine in response to the same stimulus, the more the habit becomes stronger and becomes more and more automatic and less subject to conscious control.”
What to do: 4 points
To put into practice the combined strategy of willpower-awareness-habit it is important to pay attention to some aspects that Professor Sarracino illustrates below.
«Be aware of the habits we want to change: let’s write a list with the negative ones to eliminate and the positive ones to adopt». «Identify clear, realistic and short-term objectives: these must be measurable goals and, to make it easier, we divide the process into steps smaller and more manageable”. at the same time we used to eat the comfort food we introduce the new habit”. “Give compliments: this is called positive reinforcement and consists of rewarding ourselves every time we successfully adopt a new habit. For example, let’s give ourselves small rewards, like a chocolate, when we reach a goal. Even the practical and emotional support of friends, family or professionals can be crucial to change”, concludes the expert.
The two practical examples
To train the ability to listen to ourselves, we could copy from one of the longest-lived populations in the world, that of the Japanese island of Okinawa who made listening to the body’s signals one of the secrets of well-being. In fact, the “hara hachi bu” principle, that is, eating until 80% full, is now integrated into its culture. At that moment the Okinawans pay close attention to the pleasure principle: they feel at ease when they are not 100% full, because this is now their habit.
A trick to understand if we are really full is to wait 20 minutes before choosing the next course: like in a restaurant, if the wait is long the appetite goes away. “This is, in fact, the time the brain needs to register the sensation of satiety,” says Carol Coricelli, researcher in Cognitive Neuroscience at the Institut Lyfe in Lyon (France). «Foods that do not favor the recognition of the type of hunger are in particular those with a high sugar content while those rich in fiber reduce the sensations of hunger close to meals».
April 6, 2024
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