Eating while watching screens — any screens — means eating more: study

While sitting down to watch your favourite television show may seem like a relaxing way to unwind, it also could fuel your appetite, leading to binge eating.

While sitting down to watch your favourite television show may seem like a relaxing way to unwind, it also could fuel your appetite, leading to binge eating.

A study, published by Elsevier in the February edition of the peer-reviewed journal Appetite, found that adults tend to eat more when glued to their screens, whether it’s a cooking show, a thrilling action flick or mindless phone scrolling.

The study also found that women were more likely to eat while watching screens than men.

“The results indicated that consuming food while watching screens leads to increased food intake due to the distraction caused by screen use, regardless of the screen content,” the researchers stated in the study. “This phenomenon is particularly evident among females and may be attributed to psychological constructs of eating behavior.”

Prolonged television watching has previously been linked to health issues such as obesity and diabetes, as it often promotes sedentary behaviour and can lead to increased calorie consumption due to mindless eating, reduced awareness of fullness cues and exposure to advertisements for unhealthy foods.

For example, research shows that people who watch television for more than three hours a day are significantly more likely to develop diabetes. Similarly, spending long hours in front of other screens, like computers, smartphones and tablets, is strongly connected to a higher risk of obesity and hypertension.

On the flip side, cutting back on TV time is linked to a lower risk of being overweight or obese.

While research exists on this topic, the authors of the Appetite study argue there is still a lack of systematic reviews exploring how screen exposure affects eating in adults, particularly when considering factors like the type of screen, the content being viewed and the duration of exposure.