What is Food Noise?

‘Food noise’ is thinking about food even when you aren’t physically in need of food. It is a psychologically driven process, unlike real hunger which comes from your body needing nutrients and fuel.

Food noise can lead to an unhealthy relationship with food that can have consequences for your health. It’s important to understand the difference between food noise and genuine hunger so you can manage your cravings to maintain your health. In this guide, we’ll be providing all the information you may need on ‘food noise’ including what it is, what causes it, and how to conquer it, so you can take control of your eating habits for your health.

Food noise is the term used to describe regular thoughts about food which happen even when you’re not feeling physically hungry. It’s mainly a mental desire to eat food rather than a signal that your body physically needs food and nourishment. Real physiological hunger is driven by your body needing nutrients and energy from food, whereas the mental craving to eat known as food noise is more likely to be linked to habits, emotions, and environmental triggers.

Examples of food noise may include:

• finding yourself thinking about having a snack a short time after eating a meal
• feeling like you really want a particular food after seeing an advert for it, even though you’ve just eaten

Managing these thoughts isn’t always easy and it can be difficult to keep a healthy relationship with food. Following through on these urges can lead to unhealthy food choices or overeating.

Food noise isn’t the same for everyone. You might find that for you, food noise is always thinking about your next meal, or it could be having a strong urge to eat snacks even when you’ve just had plenty to eat. Having these regular thoughts about food can disrupt your daily life and make it hard to focus on anything else.

The difference between food noise and hunger is psychological versus physical. Being able to recognise whether you’re getting food noise or if you are actually hungry is key to being able to identify and manage your cravings.

Food noise

Food noise often happens due to psychological, emotional, and habitual reasons rather than a physical need to eat. Reasons you might get food noise include:

• being bored
• being stressed
• feeling emotional

This could be because thinking about eating and having food might help to distract you from what you’re feeling.

Similarly, seeing or smelling something that you really enjoy may make you feel like eating even though your body isn’t currently craving food. Sometimes food noise might be caused by being on a diet or being told by a health professional to avoid certain foods, leading to persistent thoughts about foods you’re limiting your intake of.

Physical hunger

Being physically hungry is signalled by your body and means that you need to fuel it with food. You might get symptoms like:

• a growling stomach
• light-headedness
• low energy

But unlike food noise, hunger normally comes on slowly and goes away after you eat a balanced meal.

Hunger is best thought of as being regulated by biological processes in your body. On the other hand, food noise is more psychological.

Food noise is thought to be a common experience. Exact research is limited when it comes to just exactly how common food noise is although if you ask most people, they’ve experienced it. One study reported that food noise is something experienced particularly by people going through their weight loss journey without appetite suppressants like weight loss treatments or injections.

This is one reason why it can be extremely difficult to lose weight and stick to a reduced-calorie diet, or one that involves removing whole food groups.

Several factors can contribute to food noise, including psychological and environmental ones, as well as habitual eating cues and dieting. Social and cultural factors might also influence food noise.

Stress, boredom, or anxiety can lead to food noise as a means to distract yourself from what you’re feeling. As a result, this might result in a pattern of unhealthy habits of acting on your thoughts about food and eating when you feel psychologically uncomfortable.

If your food choices are often impacted by your mental health, speak to your GP or a trained counsellor. Eating to deal with your emotions may lead to eating disorders and can make it much harder to maintain a healthy weight. Sometimes getting to the root cause of how you’re feeling, or treating a mental health condition like anxiety or depression, can help you find a healthy relationship with food and your body.

Seeing food adverts, being at social gatherings such as a buffet, or seeing or smelling food can trigger you to think about and crave food even if you’re not physically hungry.

If you regularly snack at a certain time, you might find yourself feeling the urge to have a snack even if you don’t physically need it. This automatic craving for food because of a habit can be a cause of food noise.

Trying to cut certain foods out can be difficult. You may find that the more you remove foods you previously ate and enjoyed, the more you are likely to think about them. This is known as the ‘forbidden fruit’ effect. Research also suggests that if you diet regularly or have a history of disordered eating, you’re more likely to get food noise. For example, a study found that those on low-carbohydrate diets combined with fasting experienced more food cravings.

It’s best not to cut whole food groups out of your diet, and work slowly to limit unhealthy foods instead of trying to do it all at once.

Social and cultural factors may also influence food noise, such as through food advertising. For instance, a study on chocolate cravings in Spanish and American people suggested that American cultural influence encourages chocolate cravings in females more than in males.

Another recent study found that showing food adverts on people’s smartphones made them feel significantly hungrier.

Food noise can have a negative impact on your physical and emotional wellbeing. It could result in you eating too much, eating unhealthily, and gaining weight. It may also impact your emotions, such as by making you feel guilty or anxious after eating or for wanting to eat.

Constantly thinking about food might lead you to eat when you’re not physically hungry. This can then disrupt your hunger later and lead to disordered and unbalanced eating.

If your food noise makes you crave unhealthy foods, the nutrients you get will be negatively affected and this can have health consequences later.

One consequence of eating unhealthily in response to food noise is gaining weight. You may also gain weight if you eat unnecessarily, even if the food is not unhealthy. For some people, weight gain might be necessary. However, gaining weight to the point of being overweight or obese can affect your health.

Thinking about food all the time might make you feel stressed, frustrated, or guilty. This could lead to an unhealthy relationship with food and eating, or make you anxious about food choices, such as in social situations.

Food noise might make it hard for you to concentrate on the things you need and want to do in your life, such as hobbies and work. It could begin to disrupt your performance at work or your enjoyment and satisfaction in life.

Managing your food noise requires you to use mental strategies, change your environment, and adjust your lifestyle. Techniques such as mindfulness, eating balanced meals, and challenging your thoughts might help to reduce intrusive thoughts about food. For some people, medical interventions like counselling and weight loss injections may be considered.

Mindfulness and meditation

Practising mindfulness can help you become more aware of physical hunger versus food noise. Meditating and doing breathing exercises can also reduce stress-related cravings.

Try mindful eating, where you focus on each bite and eat without distractions. One study found that mindful eating can help reduce the amount of food you eat.

Balanced meals

Eating balanced meals which contain fibre, protein, and healthy fats can help to keep you feeling full for longer and reduce cravings.

➤ For more information on balanced eating, check out the NHS's EatWell guide.

Distraction techniques

You may find that engaging in an activity you enjoy can take your mind off food noise. When troubled by food noise, you could distract yourself by trying out a new hobby or pursuing existing hobbies to find purpose outside of food noise and thoughts.

Changing your environment

Try changing things around you to avoid seeing food adverts and keep unhealthy snacks out of sight. We recommend keeping healthy snacks out so if you do find you are physically hungry you can eat something more nutritious.

Sometimes it takes not buying certain foods anymore to stop eating them.

Cognitive behavioural techniques

Assess whether you are genuinely in need of food or if it is food noise. Challenging your thoughts when you get food noise may help it to go away. Recognising the thinking patterns you get about food can be a helpful first step.

Getting a good night’s sleep

Studies suggest that inadequate sleep may lead to cravings for high-calorie foods. Try to practice good sleep hygiene to reduce food noise.

Clinical studies and reports in the media have found that some people notice that weight loss injections such as Wegovy (semaglutide) and Mounjaro can help reduce food noise. This is because GLP-1 receptor agonists signal to your brain to reduce hunger cues and slow down stomach emptying.

However, not everyone is eligible to get weight loss injections. It depends on your BMI and other health factors. You can contact one of our online doctors at ZAVA for an online consultation to check your eligibility:

Most people get food noise occasionally. But if you get it very regularly and it is affecting your life, getting professional help may be necessary.

A doctor can help to assess whether your food noise is linked to emotional, medical, or behavioural factors and provide appropriate guidance. They may be able to refer you to psychological therapies, nutritional counselling, or medical interventions to help you manage it.

➤ In the meantime, learn more about your cravings with our Craving Calculator for more advice on how to curb your food noise.

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