Want to Eat Less? Try a Bigger Fork, University of Utah Study

One way to avoid overeating at your favorite restaurant may be to order bigger cutlery, a new study suggests. When eating out, people who used a large fork for bigger bites ate less than those who used a smaller utensil, according to findings released online in advance of publication in an upcoming print edition of the Journal of Consumer Research. In conducting the field study in an Italian restaurant, Arul Mishra, Himanshu Mishra and Tamara M. Masters, all of the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, provided two sizes of forks to modify customers' bite sizes. The researchers found that diners who used large forks ate less than those who were given small forks.

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