Fancy a piece of cake first thing in the morning? A chocolatey, sugary, stodgy slice as you sit down at your desk, inhale your latte, and contemplate that 2-hour morning meeting ahead? Probably not.
Come the afternoon though, it's a totally different story. Virtually nothing can stop you rushing over to your neighbour's desk when you spy them portioning out that 'leftover' birthday cake – hell, you'd probably even fight them for it if it came to it.
But why then, in the afternoon? Surely after a night's sleep and that arduous commute, you're more likely to be hungry in the morning? After refuelling at lunch, having hunger pangs for an overload of chocolate but hours later seems a bit weird... but we've all done it.
Luckily now, scientists think they've uncovered why: willpower.
Research published in the journal Food Quality and Preference suggests that dwindling willpower could be responsible for our afternoon cravings. A survey questioned 300 women on their automatic preferences and the amount of time it took for them to act upon them. The results revealed that the women were more inclined to go for unhealthy food in the afternoons than they were in the mornings.
Speaking to The Times, Ashleigh Haynes from the University of Liverpool said: 'One reason for this could be that foods are not considered appropriate at certain times. It could just be that later in the day people are more receptive to eating these kinds of foods. Perhaps if they are offered a pizza in the morning they think, 'I won’t do that, it’s the morning.''
However, she then went on to say that the time-appropriateness of food didn't fully explain it, and that a decline in willpower might also be responsible. 'There is this idea that self-control is a limited resource. As you exert it, less becomes available.
'We found later in the day people are less able to control automatic reactions,' she added. Possible reasons for this could be because of all the other things we have to restrain throughout the working day – the urge to check Facebook/Twitter/SnapChat/Instagram during office hours, for instance, or decisively not replying to texts or WhatsApps, and of course, trying not to peek at the Grazia Daily website... We can see how, when it comes to food, our willpower just can't take it anymore.
So we might have found a solution: give in to one of those other temptations. Or, to put simply, just read Grazia Daily – all the time.
Simple!
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