For those who get cranky when they skip lunch, this may be the perfect excuse: researchers have confirmed that missing food makes otherwise tolerable people “grubby”.
In one of the first studies to examine how hunger affects emotions as people go about their daily lives, psychologists found that the more hungry people feel, the angrier – or hungrier – they become.
The research was done after Prof Viren Swamy, a social psychologist at Anglia Ruskin University, was told – more than once – that he was hungry and needed to do something about it. The challenge made him wonder if being hungry was a real phenomenon.
Working with researchers in Austria and Malaysia, Swami recruited 64 adults aged 18 to 60 to record their emotions and feelings of hunger five times a day for three weeks. Although the relationship between hunger and emotions has been studied in laboratories, volunteers have observed their feelings as they go about their daily lives.
Writing in the journal Plos One, psychologists describe how hunger is linked to stronger feelings of anger and irritability and lower levels of pleasure. “It turns out that being hungry is a real thing,” Swami said.
The study doesn’t offer any radical solutions, but Swami believes that the ability to recognize and label the emotion itself can be beneficial. “A lot of the time we may be aware of what we’re feeling but not understand why. If we can label it, we can better do something about it,” he said.
Researchers have a number of hypotheses that aim to explain why hunger can take control of our emotions. One is based on studies showing that low blood sugar increases impulsivity, anger, and aggression. But it is not clear whether such a loss of self-control can arise from small drops in blood glucose. Another suggests that when people are hungry, they are more likely to look at the world with irritable eyes.
Regardless of the mechanism, Swamy believes the study raises a serious question: Children who go to school hungry are less likely to learn effectively and are more likely to have behavioral problems, so ensuring students get the right nutrition should be priority. “It’s really important to be able to identify emotions like hunger so we can mitigate the negative effects,” he said.
For adults who find their social skills plummet after skipping lunch, the advice is clear: “Don’t starve yourself,” Swami said. “Although for a lot of people, that’s easier said than done.”
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