A few years ago my mom and I were on our way to the grocery store, to obviously go grocery shopping. However. shortly before we got there my mom decided to stop and get something to eat before proceeding to shop. I remember saying, “why couldn’t you just wait for after shopping?” She replied with, “because grocery shopping on an empty stomach causes you to buy more unhealthy food that you probably wouldn’t buy as much of with a full stomach.” From that point on I have never gone grocery shopping while hungry, but am I really being healthier? I decided to research this topic to see what I could find.

According to Amy Yaroch, “Don’t go shopping when you’re hungry because you’re just going to buy all sorts of junk food.” A recent observational study was conducted by a group of researchers and published in JAMA Internal Medicine. These researchers basically created their own grocery store. They observed both hungry shoppers and shoppers who had just had a snack. On average, the hungry and full shoppers both purchased eight items low in calories. These low calorie items include dairy products and meat products. However, the hungry shoppers also bought six items with high calorie counts in addition to the low calorie items. The shoppers who were not hungry only bought four high calorie products.

This study could be due to chance. The people that had already eaten may just buy less than the people who were hungry. Also, they did not really get any background information on the people they observed. For example, somebody who they were observing may have not been hungry, however maybe the reason why that person was not buying unhealthy foods was because they were currently on a diet. The people who were hungry may have purchased a lot of junk food, but maybe it was for their kids and they were not going to be eating that. If this study is incorrect, it would be a false positive.

Another study I found on this topic was conducted by the research team at Cornell University’s Food and Brand Lab. 68 participants, aged between 18 to 62, were asked to shop online in a virtual grocery store. Half of the participants were instructed not to eat between the hours of 12 pm and 5 pm. The other half were asked to eat crackers until they felt full. After shopping, the customers who had not eaten for five hours had ended up purchasing more high-calorie items than the customers who had consumed the crackers. The hungry customers bought 20% more items than the full customers did, their items they purchased consisted mainly of processed foods-like chips and candy.

Something that could have gone wrong with this survey is the fact that it only utilized 68 people. This is a very small amount. Using a larger group of people may have caused this study to have different results. This study could of course be due to chance, as well.

Why exactly does an empty stomach cause us to purchase items high in calories? Fasting tends to activate regions of our brain associated with reward, so hungry people are more prone to head to the junk food aisles. Next time I go to the grocery store, I will be sure to eat a quick snack before shopping.

http://www.businessinsider.com/science-proves-we-shouldnt-shop-hungry-2013-5

http://greatist.com/health/grocery-shopping-while-hungry-050813