#636: Why You Overeat and What to Do About It

We all know the basics of losing weight: don't consume more calories than your body needs. And yet many of us still overeat anyway, sometimes continually, sometimes to the point where it leads to obesity, diabetes, and a significantly lower quality of life. Why does our behavior betray our intentions to be lean and healthy?

My guest today argues that the answer lies in the ancient instincts of our brains that no longer fit the environment of the modern world. His name is Stephan Guyenet, and he's a neuroscientist, obesity researcher, and the author of The Hungry Brain: Outsmarting the Instincts That Make Us Overeat. We begin our conversation with what's changed in our country to turn obesity into an epidemic, and why Americans started gaining more weight in the 1970s. We then dive into exactly how the reward system in our brains leads us to eat more than we need to, how modern manufactured foods like Doritos hijack this reward system, and the factors that ramp up our cravings, including the buffet effect. We then explain how to push back on the desire to overeat, including reevaluating the assumption that all the food you consume needs to be delicious. From there we turn to the role that the hormone leptin plays in appetite regulation, how it can make it hard to keep the weight you lose from coming back, and the best techniques to manage this countervailing force. We end our conversation with the role stress and sleep play in weight gain.

Get the show notes at aom.is/hungrybrain.