What Is Food Noise? How to Quiet Intrusive Food Thoughts
Food noise — or persistent, ruminating thoughts about food — is real. In this post, I want to help you understand why it happens, how to quiet it, and when it might signal something deeper.
What Food Noise / Food Cue Reactivity Means
Food noise is a relatively new term for a phenomenon that is pretty well established: that feeling that you’re just thinking about food a lot. It can be in response to internal cues like physical hunger, cravings, and stress – or external cues like social situations or food smells or visuals.
Scientifically, this is sometimes referred to as Food Cue Reactivity. The general idea is that there are a variety of cues that can lead to thinking about food, and people who experience more reactivity or food noise are more likely to have persistent or ruminating thoughts in response to those cues.
"Some amount of food noise is normal. After all, we make food choice decisions every day, multiple times a day.”
Why Food Noise Can Feel Worse During a Calorie Deficit
It’s also normal for food noise to feel more prominent at certain times, particularly when you’re intentionally focused on nutrition-related goals – whether that be during a deficit, an intense training period (like leading up to a race or weightlifting meet), or the first time you’re establishing nutrition habits for overall health.
Because our habitual nutrition decisions are influenced by a lot of subconscious factors, moving toward making more mindful decisions can feel like a lot of extra mental work. But this isn’t necessarily a bad thing!
Think about a skill that feels somewhat effortless to you now but took a lot of focus and practice to develop (riding a bike or driving, for example). They may always require some level of focus and awareness in the moment, but they took much closer to 100% of your attention when you were first learning. Increased food noise can be the way that focusing on your nutrition manifests at times.
5 Strategies to Reduce Food Noise in Your Daily Life
So, if you’re having a lot of food noise and it feels disruptive, what can you do?
Food noise, this persistent thoughts about food triggered by internal or external cues, is common, especially during nutrition changes, and can lessen over time with some strategies and some practice.
1 - PAUSE BEFORE RESPONDING
Take a pause before responding. Just the act of pausing can help diminish the power of a cue over time.
2 - IDENTIFY THE CUE
Identify the food cue your thoughts are in response to, and determine if there is a way to address it. If it’s physical hunger, you should be addressing it with intention (snacks or meals high in protein, fiber, volume, or a combination of all three can be very powerful hunger management tools)
3 - USE NON-FOOD COPING TOOLS
For emotional or stress-related cues, find a way to address it that doesn’t involve food. We have another blog post with some practical exercises that are alternatives to stress eating.
4 - PREEMPTIVE PLANNING FOR HIGH-CUE SITUATIONS
Consider strategies you can utilize for any time you may be faced with similar food cues in the future, like looking at menus in advance or not showing up over-hungry for social events.
5 - DO A BRAIN DUMP
If you have a lot of unproductive thoughts, try setting a timer for 5 minutes and writing them down to get them onto paper and out of your brain
When Food Noise Persists (& What It Could Be Telling You)
Over time, food noise should naturally decrease as you develop strong habits and gain confidence. If food noise remains persistent over time, that can be an indicator that you may be holding onto unhelpful beliefs or behaviors that may feel like they are necessary to pursue your nutrition goals, but are actually maladaptive.
Things like over-restriction, classifying foods as “good” or “bad”, perfectionism, or over-reliance on strict tracking are all examples of things that can increase food noise and take a usually supportive concept and morph it into something maladaptive and possibly even harmful.
Food Noise & GLP-1 Medications
I also don’t think it’s a coincidence that the term started gaining traction around the same time GLP-1’s were being popularized for weight loss – utilizing food noise as a problem to be solved with a solution that can be sold. And while there are cases where some additional help may be needed to address persistent food noise it can be normal and totally appropriate in some situations. It can also usually be alleviated with some strategies, practice, and new habits.
Resources:
You deserve nutrition support that meets you where you are. For personalized, sustainable fat-loss habits (without the overwhelm), check out our 1:1 Nutrition Coaching and let’s build your roadmap together.
If you’re looking for a simpler way to build better habits and reduce mental load around food, grab my Ultimate Batch Prep Guide — it’s full of macro-friendly meals and planning strategies that help simplify your nutrition.
Whitney Landon-Berg
Strength enthusiast and behavior change nerd who helps clients navigate significant weight loss goals with compassion and a no-shame, real-life approach to nutrition.
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