Two studies have shown how much we eat is manipulated by our unconscious responses to food.

Eating in a dimly lit place can make it difficult to keep a track of how much you have eaten and how full you are.

Their study involved 64 volunteers who ate smaller and larger restaurant meals in darkness. The people given the large meals ate 36 per cent more food but did not feel any more satisfied or eat any less dessert than the others.

`This is also in line with the finding that people eat more from large plates, presumably because the same amount of food on a large plate looks relatively smaller,` The Age quoted Benjamin Scheibehenne, from the University of Basel in Switzerland, as saying.

Another study, of more than 100 female university students in Canada, found that when dieters believed they had eaten too much, they abandoned their diet and ate more of the foods they were avoiding.

And it would even occur if the dieter simply saw another portion of food that appeared smaller than their own, researchers found.

Text courtesy: ANI

Image: Flickr/creativecommons miss pupik