THINKING about food all the time could actually make you eat less, scientists believe. Obsessing about a particular food in a particular way appeared to dampen its appeal in an unusual study that demonstrates that merely thinking about a food - without actually seeing, touching, smelling or tasting it - can help sate hunger through a process called habituation. In an experiment described in Fridays edition of the journal Science, researchers asked volunteers to devote about a minute and a half to methodically imagining chewing and swallowing 30 M&Ms, one after another. Then, when presented with a bowl of M&Ms, those volunteers ate about half as many candies as volunteers who imagined eating only three M&Ms, or none at all. The finding challenges the conventional wisdom that thinking about a food makes you eat more of it, said study leader Carey Morewedge, a professor of social and decision sciences at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. Thought suppression tends to sensitize people to craving, he said. A better way to deal with cravings might be to imagine indulging them. Morewedge said he believes imaginary eating works because it triggers habituation, the psychological phenomenon that explains why we are able to get used to things that initially seem annoying - the roar of an airplane engine, for instance, or dim light in a restaurant. It occurs when extended exposure to a stimulus decreases an organisms response to it, and many experts think it helps regulate eating. Until now it was believed that direct sensory input was necessary for habituation to kick in. But if it can be triggered through thought alone, there could be many ramifications for dieters. LA Times For starters, avoid buffets, said Frances McSweeney, a professor of psychology at Washington State University who studies habituation and eating but wasnt involved in the study. If you want to eat less, dont have a variety of foods available because that makes it harder to habituate to any one of them. The finding also suggests that people should also eat in a quiet place - not in front of the TV or at a sidewalk cafe - because outside stimuli can also disrupt habituation, she said. LA Times