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To all of you who have had a guilty conscience up to now when you have had your hand at chocolate, chips and co: snacking is in your genes!
Unhealthy eating habits have many factors. One of them is also in our genes, according to a new study. So if you are one of those people who like to snack a lot and who struggle to get through the day without their daily portion of chocolate, let me tell you: It is not just a matter of getting used to or discipline. No. According to science, you were born with a tendency towards snacks. You can read here why chips are addicting, by the way.
As researchers at MedUni Vienna found out, snacking is often inherited as a behavioral pattern. Because of this, pre-stressed people have a much harder time losing weight. The team led by nutritional epidemiologist Leonie-Helen Bogl published a study with 4,036 participating twins. The subjects were examined for their genetic makeup and environmental factors. But a list of risks has also been compiled - around one million gene variants for obesity are known to date.
4 behavior patterns identified
The team was able to determine four different eating behavior patterns from the investigations: "Snacking" (snacking between meals), "Irregular and unhealthy eating", "Restrictive eating" and "Emotional eating behavior". The identical twins showed a more similar eating behavior than the dizygoti twin pairs. It is therefore assumed that some of these behavior patterns are inherited. "These results are not intended to discourage people, but to show why some people have more difficulty maintaining their weight than others. Genes are by no means deterministic," emphasized Bogl. So the next time you have chips, put it on your genes …
