Thinking Makes Us Over Eat?

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Food for thought: Intellectual activities make people eat more than when just resting, according to a study that sheds new light on brain food.

This finding might also help explain the obesity epidemic of an increasingly sedentary society in which people still have to think now and then. Researchers split 14 university student volunteers into three groups for a 45-minute session of either relaxing in a sitting position, reading and summarizing a text, or completing a series of memory, attention, and vigilance tests on the computer.

The students who had done the computer tests downed 253 more calories, or 29.4 percent more than the couch potatoes. Those who had summarized a text consumed 203 more calories than the resting group.

Blood samples taken before, during, and after revealed that intellectual work causes much bigger fluctuations in glucose levels than rest periods, perhaps owing to the stress of thinking.

The researchers figure the body reacts to these fluctuations by demanding food to restore glucose, a sugar that is the brain's fuel. Glucose is converted by the body from carbohydrates and is supplied to the brain via the bloodstream. The brain cannot make glucose and so needs a constant supply. Brain cells need twice as much energy as other cells in the body.