Weight worry for computer game fans

Researchers have shown that playing games, or simply working through lunch, leads to your body forgetting you have actually eaten at all.

In an online study, researchers from the nutrition and behaviour unit in the School of Experimental Psychology at the University of Bristol have been exploring ways in which memory and attention influence appetite and food intake.

Volunteers were split into two groups, with one group eating a lunch of nine different foods while playing solitaire – a computerised card-sorting game.

The second group ate the same lunch but without any distractions.

The researchers found those who played solitaire felt less full after lunch and just 30 minutes later ate twice as many snacks as the non-distracted participants.

Those who had been playing the computer game could not even remember the food items they had eaten.