Better Monitoring of Food Quantity Makes Self-Control Easier

If you have poor self control when eating unhealthy food, there's a trick that can boost it.

In one study, the researchers asked participants to monitor themselves as they ate by counting how many times they swallowed. With this subtle clue to the amount eaten, those with low self-control became satisfied at a faster rate. Redden said they were surprised at how easy it was to recreate self-control -- just using a baseball pitch counter made low self-control people act like they had high self-control.

"People can essentially use attention for how much they are consuming instead of relying on self-control," Redden says. "Really paying a lot more attention to the quantity will lead people to feel satiated faster and eat less."

Perhaps a crowd counter would be an easier tool to use, to help us pay close attention to how much we're eating.