If you think back to yesterday, you may remember a time when you stopped what you were doing to “graze” on something — whether it was a piece of chocolate , a cookie, a handful of nuts , or even a piece of fruit. This is a common and routine behavior, called grazing , but it can be a health risk when it becomes repetitive and affects your control over it.
What is grazing ?
In a free translation from English, the term means “grazing”. The phenomenon is still little studied in Brazil and its definition was recently updated. It involves the ingestion of small amounts of food in a repetitive and unplanned manner, without being a response to hunger, with some level of loss of control. It is different from compulsion, characterized by the consumption of a large amount of food (such as an entire pizza at once), in a single and non-repeated action.
What are the main features?
The habit of “grazing” several times a day does not always constitute harmful behavior. Identifying grazing has more to do with the level of loss of control due to that action than with the number of times the person “grazes” some food.
This means that the individual may have snacked five times a day, but with complete control. At the same time, he or she may have snacked less often, with loss of control from the first time.
When does it become a problem?
This behavior becomes a problem the more it is associated with loss of control – hence the importance of having tools to identify it as soon as possible. When you realize that you cannot stop that behavior, it indicates loss of control, and this would be the ideal time to seek specialized help.
How to identify it?
In general, grazing is associated with the time of day when a person seeks some type of relaxation or relief through food to compensate for a certain situation. Knowing how to identify this behavior can help prevent other disorders associated with psychological and eating problems, including compulsion.
How is the diagnosis made?
Brazilian researchers have developed a grazing screening tool through research conducted at the University of São Paulo (USP) in Ribeirão Preto, in the interior of São Paulo. The tool does not provide a diagnosis, but it is capable of identifying problematic signs of this behavior and indicating the need for referral for a clinical evaluation, so that the case can be properly assessed.
Who is at risk?
To develop the screening tool, the Brazilian study investigated and assessed the manifestation of grazing in a sample of 823 people – 542 of whom were of normal weight and 281 were overweight or obese. Twelve items were assessed that identify the behavior divided into two subscales: repetitive grazing , which is not as harmful because it is associated with a lower level of unregulated eating, and compulsive grazing , which is in fact harmful to health because it is more associated with lack of control.
The results showed that compulsive grazing was more significant in the sample of people with obesity. Furthermore, the results corroborate international studies and confirm that compulsive grazing is more associated with mental disorders, especially anxiety, depression and stress.
Symptom relief
Another conclusion of the work is that grazing works as an emotional regulation mechanism – it is practiced in search of relief from other symptoms (such as depression, stress and anxiety), with stress appearing as a mediator in the manifestation of this behavior.
This explains the correlation with symptoms of stress and anxiety, associated with higher levels of weight. It is not possible to say that stress causes grazing , but it is highly relevant in interfering with this behavior.