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Craving something for dinner? Your mind may be 'tasting' food before you eat it
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2026-06-craving-dinner-mind-food.htmlMaggie Hames, Mei Peng, The Conversation
Another one of my "Well, duh" clippings.
We've all made that mistake. A quick trip to the supermarket on an empty stomach ends with a trolley full of fatty, sugary treats that seemed impossible to resist at the time.
It speaks to that old adage about hunger making our eyes bigger than our bellies. But our newly published research finds food cravings can also alter our "mind's eye"--that mental imagery that enables us to visualize, or even taste, that first bite.
. . .
Intriguingly, we have also discovered that not all of us can do this in the same way: Some can relive sensory experiences in rich detail, while others can form only faint impressions.
Moreover, these abilities don't appear to be fixed: Just how easily we can draw on this mental imagery can change depending on our internal state and motivations.
. . .
It speaks to that old adage about hunger making our eyes bigger than our bellies. But our newly published research finds food cravings can also alter our "mind's eye"--that mental imagery that enables us to visualize, or even taste, that first bite.
. . .
Intriguingly, we have also discovered that not all of us can do this in the same way: Some can relive sensory experiences in rich detail, while others can form only faint impressions.
Moreover, these abilities don't appear to be fixed: Just how easily we can draw on this mental imagery can change depending on our internal state and motivations.
. . .