This Study Says That Instagramming Your Food Could Make It Less Enjoyable To Eat

When eating out, it’s completely natural to reach out for your phone rather than fork when your food arrives at your table. You take a photo of your beautifully plated food, do some quick edits and then upload it on Instagram. As you eat, you enjoy the sound of notifications coming in as people like your photo.

Sounds familiar, right? Well, the habit may be preventing you from completely enjoying your meal according to a recent study.

Photo Satisfaction versus Actual Satisfaction

According to marketing professors at the BYU Marriott School of management, a repeated exposure to photos of food can reduce people’s satisfaction when they actually eat the meal.

“When we Instagram, we inherently must focus our attention on the item in the picture, even for that very brief moment. This can have a range of effects on later enjoyment,” co-author Professor Joseph Redden said to the Independent.

“If we spend too much time repeatedly viewing such foods, our paper suggests this can lead to pre-satiation. That is, you’re already a bit tired of the food before you even start eating it,” he added.

And, when you’re dishing out a hefty sum to enjoy a meal at an upscale restaurant, wouldn’t you thoroughly enjoy your meal rather than pulling out your phone?