Appetite: Measurement and Manipulation Misgivings

doi:10.1016/j.jada.2005.02.029

Journal of the American Dietetic Association

Volume 105, Issue 5, Supplement, May 2005, Pages 87-97

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jada.2005.02.029 Get rights and content

Abstract

Humans appear to have a genotype that permits, or even encourages, an energy intake that is greater than energy expenditure when food is available. This was functional throughout most of human evolution but is less so in the current environment of inexpensive, palatable, and readily available foods. To achieve dietary goals of weight loss or maintenance, attempts have been made to influence appetitive sensations through the manipulation of the physical properties of foods, their composition, or their pattern of consumption. This has led to limited success, in part, because measurement of appetitive sensations is difficult but, more fundamentally, because the association between appetite and food choice or intake is not robust. This article critically reviews the most common methods for assessment of appetite and the effects of selected food constituents on appetitive sensations. Translation of current knowledge to dietetic practice must be made cautiously.

Section snippets

Nature of appetitive sensations

Appetite is often divided into three components: hunger, satiation, and satiety. Hunger describes the sensations that promote food consumption and is a multidimensional attribute with metabolic, sensory, and cognitive facets (4, 5). Following the initiation of a meal and as eating proceeds, hunger subsides while satiation, the sensations that govern meal size and duration, becomes increasingly dominant (6). Eventually, feelings of satiation will contribute to the cessation of eating and begin a

Dietary modulation of appetite

Knowledge of appetitive sensations may serve multiple purposes. It can be a tool to understand basic metabolism as well as behavior. From a dietetics perspective, the primary interest lies in the assumed associations between appetitive indices and the interest in eating, food choices, energy balance, and body weight. Presumably, foods with high satiation or satiety value should aid in controlling energy intake, whereas items with low values should provide a weaker barrier to consumption. The

Fat

Fat has traditionally been regarded as the macronutrient with the strongest satiety property. This stems from the historical focus on the stomach as a primary source of hunger/satiation cues and knowledge that fat clears from the stomach more slowly than the other macronutrients. Thus, it prolongs gastric distention. However, this view suffers from a failure to recognize that gastric cues are only one of multiple determinants of appetitive sensations. Indeed, gastrectomized patients have normal

Food volume or weight

For over a decade, fat was considered a prime contributor to positive energy balance. This was attributed to its palatability, low satiation value, efficient metabolism, and high energy density. The latter was viewed as problematic because of evidence that humans tend to eat a constant weight or volume of food daily (84). This was first demonstrated in feeding trials in which participants were allowed ad libitum access to foods of varying macronutrient composition. Under these conditions, the

Dietary or sensory variety

Whether sensory variety is inherently pleasing and promotes overconsumption can be debated. Restriction of variety is an effective short-term weight management approach because monotony results in a spontaneous reduction of intake (88). However, the desire for variety is so strong that, almost invariably, adherence to such a diet fails and weight is rapidly recovered. Dietary variety was not promoted in the previous dietary guidelines because of concern that the message would be interpreted as

Rheology

Consumption of energy-yielding beverages has increased in concert with body weight over the past 2 decades, prompting concern that it is causally related. There are strong data indicating that the energy from beverages adds to the diet rather than replacing other energy sources (92). That is, energy-yielding beverages do not evoke dietary compensation (93). Beverages now contribute approximately 25% of the energy in the US diet (94). Although carbonated soft drinks contribute the largest

Dietary periodicity

Meal frequency and timing have also been implicated in the overweight/obesity problem, the common beliefs being that fewer meals and eating in the evening promote positive energy balance. Interest in meal frequency stems from observations of an inverse association between self-reported eating frequency and indices of girth or body fat. However, a critical review of this work reveals alternative explanations (98). First, reverse causality is a likely explanation of the association. That is,

Summary

Despite a long history of research, the mechanisms and functions of appetitive sensations remain poorly characterized. This is, in part, because of difficulties in identifying the key metrics and methods to quantify them. Work on the topic has increased recently because of a belief that the current overweight/obesity epidemic results from a failure to respond to appetitive cues that attempt to balance energy intake and energy expenditure. However, the underlying premise of this view is

Future directions

Future efforts to elucidate the mechanisms and functions of appetite will be most productive if they emanate from the recognition that appetite is multidimensional. It has a biologic basis composed of a wide array of redundant (eg, multiple endocrine signals that promote and reduce appetitive sensations) and interacting (eg, gastric stretch with incretin release) components that may be viewed as an integrated system to balance energy needs with supply. However, there are also sensory and

R.D. Mattes is a professor of Foods and Nutrition, J. Hollis is a postdoctoral research associate, Department of Foods and Nutrition, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN

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It is often suggested in the popular press that food chains deliberately introduce enticing product aromas into (and in the immediate vicinity of) their premises in order to attract customers. However, despite the widespread use of odours in the field of sensory marketing, laboratory research suggests that their effectiveness in modulating people's food behaviours depends on a range of contextual factors. Given the evidence that has been published to date, only under a subset of conditions is there likely to be a measurable effect of the presence of ambient odours on people's food attitudes and choices. This narrative historical review summarizes the various ways in which food odours appear to bias people's food preferences (appetite) and food choices (food consumption and purchase). Emphasis is placed on those experimental studies that have been designed to investigate how the characteristics of the olfactory stimuli (e.g., the congruency between the olfactory cues and the foods, intensity and duration of exposure to odours, and taste properties of odours) modulate the effects of olfactory cues on food behaviour. The review also explores the moderating roles of individual differences, such as dietary restraint, Body Mass Index (BMI), genetic and cultural differences in odour sensitivity and perception. Ultimately, following a review of empirical studies on food-related olfaction, current approaches in scent marketing are discussed and a research agenda is proposed to help encourage further studies on the effective application of scents in promoting healthy foods.
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R.D. Mattes is a professor of Foods and Nutrition, J. Hollis is a postdoctoral research associate, Department of Foods and Nutrition, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN

D.Hayes is president, Nutrition For The Future, Inc, Billings, MT

A.J. Stunkard is a professor of Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia

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ResearchCurrent researchAppetite: Measurement and Manipulation Misgivings

Abstract

Section snippets

Nature of appetitive sensations

Dietary modulation of appetite

Fat

Food volume or weight

Dietary or sensory variety

Rheology

Dietary periodicity

Summary

Future directions

Am J Clin Nutr

Am J Med

Appetite

J Am Diet Assoc

Appetite

Neurosci Biobehav Rev

Neurosci Biobehav Rev

Appetite

J Psychosom Res

Physiol Behav

J Psychiatr Res

Appetite

Physiol Behav

Physiol Behav

J Am Diet Assoc

Appetite

Appetite

Appetite

Neurosci Biobehav Rev

Physiol Behav

Appetite

Lancet

Am J Clin Nutr

Appetite

Physiol Behav

Physiol Behav

Am J Clin Nutr

Am J Clin Nutr

Appetite

Am J Clin Nutr

Am J Clin Nutr

Appetite

Am J Clin Nutr

J Am Diet Assoc

Am J Clin Nutr

Appetite

Gastroenterology

Appetite

Am J Clin Nutr

Am J Clin Nutr

J Am Diet Assoc

J Nutr

Physiol Behav

Am J Clin Nutr

J Nutr

Physiol Behav

Physiol Behav

Lancet

Trends in obesity and energy supply in the WHO MONICA project

Int J Obes

Research
Current research
Appetite: Measurement and Manipulation Misgivings