Why you open the fridge when you're not hungry

Open the fridge, look, close it. Half an hour later, again. It's still milk, pickles and cheese in there, and yet we keep coming back. Before you look at the comic, answer silently: how many times in the past week have you opened it without being hungry?

ComicThe dog talks, only the man can hear it. Below the comic: what experiments say about it.

Psíchologie, episode 1 · Not hungry

The dog asks about the fridge, but means something else. When you're not hungry and still searching, you're usually not after food. You want something to change: the boredom, the restlessness, the empty evening.

Make a guess before reading on: how many people would rather give themselves an electric shock than sit for 15 minutes just thinking?

In an experiment by Timothy Wilson and colleagues (2014), 12 of 18 men (67%) and 6 of 24 women (25%) gave themselves at least one mild electric shock during 15 minutes alone. Earlier, they had tried the shock and said they would pay not to get it again.

We're not looking for food. We're looking for something to change.

Boredom pushes us to food and even to pain. In an experiment by Remco Havermans and colleagues (2015), people watched either a documentary for an hour or one short clip from it over and over. During the boring clip they ate more M&M's, and in a second experiment they gave themselves more electric shocks. The authors conclude that when bored, we eat not for the taste but to escape the monotony.

The fridge is the nearest way out. It's a few steps away, it lights up and for a moment it promises something. But what needs to change isn't inside the fridge. So half an hour later comes the next opening.

A simple test: next time before you open the fridge, say what you're looking for. If you don't know, you're probably not looking for food. Try it on the last time you opened it. It takes one to three questions.

IllustrationIt only tells apart four common reasons based on your answers, it isn't a measurement or a diagnosis. Your answers aren't stored anywhere.

Question 1

Think of the last time you opened the fridge.

Was it really hunger?

Another view

Maybe it's not about feelings but habit. Psychologists Peggy Bongers and Anita Jansen (2016) reviewed experiments in which people who call themselves emotional eaters were expected to eat more after a bad mood was induced. Often they didn't. In their view, these questionnaires don't measure what they claim to; one possible explanation is that they capture what people blame their overeating on. And in an experiment by David Neal and colleagues (2011), people used to eating popcorn at the movies ate almost as much week-old popcorn as fresh. In a meeting room watching music videos, they didn't. On this view, it isn't boredom that pulls the man to the fridge, but the kitchen and the evening: the place and time where he always does it.

What the other side says: Havermans showed the effect of boredom in an experiment, not a questionnaire. Both explanations can be true at once: for some people mood matters more, for others habit.