Chewing and weight loss may be linked, a new Chinese study reports--the more you chew, the less you weigh.
In the study, which appeared in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, a group of obese men and a group of lean men were fed pork pie for breakfast after a 12-hour fast, and told they could ask for more. The obese men chewed their food less, as researchers had predicted, and consumed more calories, though the size of their bites was the same.
However, in a later study, when researchers at Harbin Medical University told all the men to chew at least 40 times, 12 percent fewer calories were ingested overall, reported MSNBC. Chewing more also led to lower levels of ghrelin, the "hunger hormone" produced in the stomach.
“Chewing less is a risk factor for obesity,” the scientists concluded in the study.
