One of the reasons why many people today have problems maintaining or reducing their weight is due to a disturbed feeling of satiety. This can have several causes.
What is the feeling of satiety?
One of the reasons why many people today have problems maintaining or reducing their weight is because of a disturbed feeling of satiety. A feeling of satiety is a body signal that occurs when eating, indicating to the eater that he or she cannot take in any more food. It is controlled by the brain and is a complex process, the details of which have not yet been fully researched. The interaction of hunger and satiety is responsible for supplying the body with sufficient food and nutrients. A distinction is made between a feeling of satiety and a feeling of fullness, which only occurs a while after a meal. When the feeling of satiety is disturbed, the body’s regulatory mechanisms between hunger, appetite and satiety do not work or no longer work properly.
Function and task
The task of the feeling of satiety is to indicate to the body when it has taken in enough food and nutrients. The feeling of satiety is virtually the counterpart of the feeling of hunger, which indicates to the body when food is needed. It is through the interaction of hunger and satiety that food intake is regulated. This is controlled by the hypothalamus in the diencephalon. In this area of the brain, all internal and external stimuli are evaluated during food intake and messenger substances are secreted that inform the body of a feeling of satiety. Satiety is not synonymous with fullness; fullness only occurs a while after a meal and describes the state after a meal until the onset of the next feeling of hunger. In the hypothalamus, there is a hunger center and a satiety center that are active at different times. Both are part of the orexic network, which is responsible for controlling food intake. Initial signals of satiety during eating are sent by the stomach when the ingested food stretches the walls of the stomach. This stimulus signal is received by the hypothalamus. However, the satiety signal does not come from the filled stomach alone; chemoreceptors send parallel signals about the extent to which nutrients have been ingested. These receptors are located in the intestine and in the liver. Both signals together have an effect on the feeling of satiety and the amount of food consumed. For example, if only a large amount of low-calorie liquid is drunk, the stomach expands and reports a signal, but the chemoreceptors do not respond and there is no feeling of satiety. It works similarly the other way around. If a small amount of food with high nutrient density has been ingested, the chemoreceptors will respond because enough nutrients have been ingested, but the stomach will not because the walls have not been stretched enough. Other satiety signals are communicated to the brain, partly through the blood and partly through neural pathways, by hormones produced in the intestine during the digestive process, including insulin and leptin. Once multiple satiety signals are sent to the hypothalamus, it responds by releasing appetite-suppressing substances such as serotonin. How many factors interact in the feeling of satiety has not yet been researched. In addition to physiological influences, psychological ones probably also play a role.
Diseases and complaints
In various eating disorders such as overweight (obesity), binge eating (bulimia), and cravings (binge eating), the interplay of hunger, appetite, and satiety does not work or no longer works completely. Although the causes have not been fully researched, it has been demonstrated that in people who frequently eat large portions, the stomach walls take longer to respond to stretching. As a result, they tend to eat too much. In turn, hasty eaters eat so quickly that the meal is over before a feeling of satiety is even reported. In overweight people, it is not entirely clear whether proper satiety signals are no longer being sent in them or whether they are unable to perceive them properly. Researchers suspect that frequent dieting irritates the metabolism and thus also the regulation of hunger and satiety. Based on dieting experiences, the body fears that it will have to build up reserves for future “hunger periods” such as diets and no longer sends a feeling of satiety.Psychological problems can also influence and significantly disturb the balance of appetite, hunger and satiety, e.g. anxiety, anger, sadness or tension. In people with bouts of cravings, as in bulimia nervosa, binge eating, but also in some overweight people, control over hunger and satiety is completely lost. They often only stop eating when they feel the urge to vomit. Psychologists see one of the causes in too strictly regimented eating behavior, both in diets and in permanently head-controlled eating. People who eat in a head-controlled manner avoid “unhealthy” foods and stop eating even before the onset of satiety in order to save calories. As a result, the body constantly remains below the required amount of calories and, according to psychologists, eventually fights back in the form of cravings when the control of the will is weakened, for example, by stress. The yo-yo effect following weight loss through dieting is a case in point.
