Women who are frustrated by loud, stressful noise seem to snack more, new research reports. Researchers have found that women who were exposed to uncontrollable noises while trying to solve math problems became frustrated by the noise more often than women who had control over the sound. Moreover, women who became frustrated by the experiment were also more likely to snack than women who were less frustrated. Researchers form the Pennsylvania State University, USA, divided 29 men and 33 women into three groups, and all were asked to solve math problems. In one group, participants were subjected to loud noises made up of speaking voices and office machines at unpredictable intervals that they could turn off if needed. Another group of participants heard the same noises and were not given the option of turning them off. The rest of the problem solvers tackled their problems in peace. After the problems, participants had their choice of snacks, including pretzels, potato chips, cheese, chocolate and popcorn. To measure how stressed people were after the noise and math problems, the researchers asked participants to tackle another challenge, this time tracing a line through an unsolvable maze without crossing any lines. The investigators reasoned that the fewer times people tried to solve the maze, the more frustrated they were by the previous noisy experiment. Women who had no control over the stressful noises during the first task tended to give up on the second task more easily than other women, a sign that they were more frustrated. Women who appeared to be frustrated after the first noisy task also tended to eat more snacks during the break than women who were not frustrated by the first experiment. Interestingly, among the men who participated in the same experiment, control over or frustration with the noise had no effect on their tendency to snack. The reason for these gender differences remains unclear. The findings suggest that, for women, lack of apparent or real control over environmental stress may result in increased high-fat food consumption after the stressor ends.
Journal of Applied Social Psychology,
June 2004