Think twice before you have those leftovers, USC Marshall study says

A recent study from the USC Marshall School of Business shows that saving bigger portions of leftovers might influence you to exercise less or eat more later.
According to Dr. Linda Hagen, who helped lead the study, the problem is actually about perception. “Leftovers from a meal can skew people’s idea about how much they ate,” she explains. “It’s difficult to judge how much we have eaten, so we’re often heavily influenced by external cues. For example, the larger portion of leftovers we see on the plate, the less we believe we ate. You might think, ‘After all, if there’s a lot left, I cannot possibly have eaten very much, right?’” She tells us that this becomes problematic in cases where it affects what happens next — like if that perception becomes a reason to eat more later on or an excuse to skip a planned workout because you feel you haven’t eaten very much.
Read the full article: How Bringing Home Leftovers Could Derail Your Health Goals (Brit + Co.)