One of the curses of being human is that we seem hard-wired for delusion. The good news is that not only is it
perfectly normal, but our misbeliefs are the very thing that have, in large part, kept us around for many generations. In any given moment, millions of thoughts pervade our brains, effecting the day-to-day moment-by-moment decisions we make. We are under the false impression, however that we are beings of pure logic: Whether it’s a decision to play candy crush rather than hit the gym or flip through another top 20 Buzzfeed article rather than chopping up some veggies to take to work, we falter in many, many ways that effect our productivity, which in turn prevents us from our goals. The 5 Cognitive Biases That Can Sabotage Your Fat Loss Goals
The first step towards making good decisions about our health is to know our number 1 enemy. In this case, the enemy is ruthless, cunning and persistent; our own brains. One of the primary reasons why humans struggle in many aspects of life is that our brains were formed in an era when the best way to save was to consume. The good news is that our biology and brain wiring is flexible – responsive to experience and therefore “trainable” to work in our favor. We have biological disadvantages to be sure, but they are not life sentences. Here are some of the most prominent cognitive (thinking) errors that prevent us from our fat loss goals and what to do about it;
1. Current Moment Bias: Among other deficits, we Homo Sapiens kind of suck at both predicting a future scenario and how we will respond to that scenario. We are a society of instant gratification – prone to the roller coaster swings of pleasure-seeking adaptation. Not surprisingly, most of us would rather experience pleasure in the current moment, while leaving the pain for later – even if the long-term reward is far greater.
This bias is of particular concern when it comes to achieving fat loss and greater health. A 1998 study confirmed the old adage “The road to hell is paved with good intentions”. When asked what they would choose when they became hungry a week in the future, 74% of participants chose fruit over junk food. But when the day arrived, 70% chose chocolate. (1)
This is the precise reason we watch “Dumb and Dumber” on TV for the 100thtime while “The English Patient” sits (not so patiently) in our Netflix cue. It’s why we are forced to throw out produce weekly that was originally destined to be consumed as salad and part of a stir fry.
We are wired to seek immediate payoff. Most people would rather take $5 now than $7 in a week. At the heart of this phenomena is impulsiveness and our ability (or inability) to delay gratification. This attribute was a benefit when resources were scarce and hard won.
An example of this phenomenon was tested in children in the well-known “marshmallow experiment” (2), where children were told they could eat one marshmallow now or wait for a bigger reward that would come later. Long-term follow-ups showed the children who could hold out for longer generally did better later on in life – getting better grades, having lower weight and achieving more success in general.
What to do: The first defense toward combating this “I want it now!” bias is to pause and reflect. Think about the choice you are making, why you are making it, and think about the long-term benefits of abstaining from an unhealthy move. The first step of self-discipline is self-awareness. Stop and think about what you’re about to do. When you start to dig below the surface of the conscious mind, the previously subconscious habits that once pulled you off track can be repaired. Learn about WHY you fail: What types of situations/emotions trigger poor choices? Seek ways of managing these situations more effectively, to your benefit.
Even a simple strategy such as the “10 minute rule” can help avert derailing indulgences. If you want something, wait 10 minutes (or longer if possible). In this time consider whether you are really hungry or if you are responding to a fleeting emotion.
2. Negativity bias: The negativity bias is the tendency to put more emphasis on negative experiences rather than positive ones. You may have noticed this tendency in yourself (although more likely in others); the glass half-empty-ers, the “negative Nancy’s” – people who perpetually see more threats than opportunities and more bad than good in the world. This bias can be a saving grace in the proper situation as negative experiences can be damaging or even life-threatening.
Negativity bias can permeate in different ways and can pull you off track when it comes to health-promoting habits. Whether it’s remembering a past injury from exercise, or how miserable you were on your last diet, we can dwell on those recollections – even if you had many positive experiences with trying to improve health. In the case of fat loss, many will only remember the intervention of choice that “didn’t work”.
Media and pop diet book culture serve to fuel the negativity through fear-mongering rhetoric about all sorts of topics. These imposed fears override any positive message about exercise or healthful eating we could ever hear about. We tend to become paralyzed and frustrated by the frequently conflicting information – rendering us to a “screw it” kind of mentality.
What to do: The best mindset in this situation is to recall your successes. Even if you haven’t had much in the way of body composition successes, it’s important to re-wire your brain to dwell on the positive experiences of training and eating well. Find your “flow” or that happy place where you are in a zone with movement. Take note of how good your body feels after a healthy meal or good workout. Also, be sure to gravitate towards healthy activities you enjoy. Ditto with food (to an extent)…seek out healthier alternatives to unfavorable foods.
3. Optimism Bias: For some of us, the flip side of the perspective coin is the optimism bias. While optimism is generally a helpful state of mind, there is a tipping point when it comes to positive thinking. The optimism bias can lull its victim into unrealistic expectations and Pollyanna-esque swagger. In essence, we can have too much unguarded optimism and not enough realism. Being overly optimistic can derail your fat loss goals in 2 ways;
1). It Keeps us from changing in the first place: If we believe “everything will be fine” when it comes to our health, it locks us into place. We pay no attention to what we eat, how little we move and the associated long-term consequences of those habits.
2). It prevents us from having a relapse plan. One of the most formidable obstacles to long-term success is failing to have a contingency plan for when you go off the rails.
If you are finding yourself perpetually optimistic without any results, it may be time to temper your view point with some reality. Successful fat loss often depends on a balanced dance of levity and gravity.
What to do: Optimism is good, but be cautiously optimistic. Understand that real life gets in the way of our perfect plans. Set goals, standards, and purposefully set yourself up to make healthy decisions – but do so in a frame of reality. Understand the journey will not be smooth, linear or easy.
Consider adjusting your self-talk. While saying “I can’t do this” is negative (read above), “I CAN do this” is surface level and lacks substance. Experts suggest implementing what’s called “interrogative self-talk”. Instead of “I can’t” or “I can”, ask the question “how can I?”. By framing as a question, you are setting off a thought process that strategizes HOW you are going to accomplish something, rather than just stating an abstract thought lacking content or a plan. (3)
4. Planning Fallacy: The planning fallacy is a tendency for people to underestimate how long they will need to complete a task. The term was first proposed in a 1979 paper by world-renown cognitive scientists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky. The planning fallacy might be seen as a natural extension to the optimism bias in that we are being overly generous on how long it should take to achieve a desired outcome. When it comes to body composition goals, we grossly underestimate the time involved in achieving more significant losses.
The epicenter of the planning fallacy as it relates to weight loss can be found in the diet fad industry. The emergence of get-lean-quick schemes that pervade western society have systematically eradicated any realistic expectation when it comes to our perceptions of “normal” rates of fat loss. At the time of this writing, 3 books in the “diet” section of the local book store promise weight loss at the rate of 1lb a day! Festooned on the cover of most diet books, weight loss clinics and web click ads are far-fetched weight loss claims such as “25 lbs in a month”, or “10 lbs in 2 weeks”. It’s no wonder our expectations are skewed when it comes to our weight loss goals.
Studies have demonstrated a strong correlation between high weight loss expectations and drop-out rates in weight loss programs (4, 5) . The Dalle study showed the strongest predictors of attrition at 12 months (52% dropped out) were lower age and higher expected 1-year loss, which reflects a tendency towards unrealistic expectations when it comes to weight loss time frames.
What to do: Calibrate your expectations. Remember if you are carrying 50 lbs more than you’d like, you didn’t gain that weight in a matter of a month or 2. With ebbs and flows of life it’s important to have relapse plans and have some wiggle room with regards to how long it might take to achieve your goal. Take pride and seek accomplishment in the journey.
5. Unit bias: The unit bias suggests that we look at units or portions (small chunks) and perceive them as appropriate or optimal – regardless of the context or reality. Brian Wansink, author of “Mindless Eating” demonstrated through a series of studies that when we are served larger portions, we eat more. Whether it’s a bottomless bowl of soup (participants consumed 73% more soup when it was being slowly refilled unbeknownst to the subjects) or big popcorn bags, (6, 7) (subjects consumed 45% more when given a larger bag. Even when the popcorn was stale, there was a 34% higher consumption).
Liquid calories fare no better when it comes to our perceived consumption. One of our many human flaws is that we don’t have 3 dimensional perception of volume (or even 2 dimensional for that matter). When it comes to volume we gauge only height. That’s why when given equal volume, we think there is more liquid in a tall, thin glass than a small wide one. It’s no wonder bars serve drinks in tall glasses and charge more for it.
Wanskink’s research again uncovered found that a group of participants (many of them bartenders) poured significantly more liquid in short, wide glasses than in tall, skinny ones of the same volume. Even the ones that poured drinks for a living poured 21% more into the stout glasses! (8)
Misleading perceptions of quantity aren’t confined to just laypeople either, with studies showing registered dieticians having trouble with the accuracy of food portions – underestimating their consumption by around 10% (9) Unit bias may be one of the most prominent determinants of how much we consume – with our north American super-sized tendencies.
What to do: First and foremost, pay attention to your hunger and fullness cues. Eat slowly, consume joyfully and mindfully. Use smaller plates and bowls and buy tall, thin drinking glasses. In restaurants, make it the norm to take some to go (try for half). If you are snacking on a bagged product, pour some into a small bowl and put the bag out of sight.
Take-home points: Many of our moment-to-moment decisions are driven by subconscious, auto-pilot type thinking. We form our habits, then our habits form us. Forming sustainable, healthier habits is the key to successful fat loss. Forming these habits is a matter of self-discipline and self-discipline is a matter of self-awareness. When we become aware of the tricks we use that result in our eating more and moving less (a.k.a, laziness), we can conquer the most formidable barriers to our success.
Keep in mind this is a process. The subtle and not-so-subtle whisperings of our subconscious habits won’t be overcome without due diligence and persistent efforts on our part. It takes mindful re-training, patience, constant practice, and self-love to upgrade the software. But, with grooming and persistence, there will be no stopping you.
References:
1. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9831521
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment
3. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20424090
4. http://www.unboundmedicine.com/medline/citation/16339128
5. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16339128
6.http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15761167
7. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16053812
8. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1322248/
9. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12396160
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