"The sounds you make while chewing have a significant effect on the amount of food you eat, a new study has found. The results suggest that people are likely to consume less if they can hear themselves eating.

一项新研究发现，咀嚼时发出的声音对摄入食物的总量有着显著影响。该研究结果显示，如果人们能听到自己吃东西时发出的声音，则有可能会吃得更少。

Researchers at Brigham Young University and Colorado State University have found that your TV, radio, and computer are making you fat. Not by bombarding you with food ads (though they totally are) but by blocking the sounds of your chewing. In a recent study, they found that the noise your food makes while you're eating can have a significant effect on how much food you eat.

美国杨百翰大学和科罗拉多州立大学的研究人员们已经发现，你的电视、收音机和电脑正在让你变得越来越胖。但它们让你变胖的方式并不是给你放各种食物广告(虽然它们一直在这样做)，而是封锁你的咀嚼声。这些研究人员们在最近的调查中发现，你在吃东西时发出来的声音会给你吃下的食物总量带来非常大的影响。

Sound is typically labeled as the forgotten food sense," adds Ryan Elder, assistant professor of marketing¹ at BYU's Marriott School of Management. "But if people are more focused on the sound the food makes, it could reduce consumption."

杨百翰大学麦里特商学院的市场营销助理教授Ryan Elder表示："声音基本被人们当做一种被遗忘的食物感觉。可如果人们能够更加专注于他们在吃东西时发出来的声音，那么这样做能够减少他们摄入的食物。"

"For the most part, consumers and researchers have overlooked food sound as an important sensory² cue in the eating experience," said study coauthor Gina Mohr, an assistant professor of marketing at CSU.

科罗拉多州立大学的市场营销助理教授Gina Mohr是本研究的共同作者，他表示："在大部分情况下，消费者和研究人员们均忽视了声音在进食体验中扮演的重要感官暗示。"

The team carried out three separate experiments to quantify the effects of "food sound salience" on quantity of food consumed during a meal. In one experiment, participants were given snacks to eat while they wore headphones playing either loud or quiet noises. The ones loud enough to mask the sound of chewing made subjects eat more — 4 pretzels compared to 2.75 pretzels for the "quiet" group.

该团队做了三个独立实验量化咀嚼声给参与者的食物摄入量带来的影响。在其中一个实验中，参与者们需佩戴着耳机吃零食。耳机里面会播放音量大和音量小的噪音，最后吃东西时耳机中大声播放噪音的参与者吃下了4块椒盐脆饼干，而听小声噪音的参与者吃下了2.75块椒盐脆饼干。

In another of their experiments they found that just having people hear chewing sounds through an advertisement can decrease the amount they eat.

在另外一个实验中，研究人员们发现让人们听广告中的咀嚼声能够减少他们的食物摄入量。

Elder and Morh call this the "Crunch³ Effect." The main takeaway of their work should be the idea of mindfulness, they said. Being more mindful of not just the taste and physical appearance of food, but also of the sound it makes can help consumers to eat less.

Elder和Morh称其为"咀嚼声效应"。他们表示他们研究工作的中心思想应该是专注。人们不仅仅应该专注于食物的味道和外表，还应该专注于吃东西时的声音，这有助于人们吃得更少。

When you mask the sound of consumption, like when you watch TV while eating, you take away one of those senses and it may cause you to eat more than you would normally," Elder said. "The effects many not seem huge —one less pretzel— but over the course of a week, month, or year, it could really add up."

Elder说："当你看着电视吃东西的时候，你的咀嚼声就被遮盖住了，这样做的后果是你可能吃得比平时多。这种影响也许看起来并不大，只是一两口饭而已，但长期下来它会累积起来让你发胖。"

So the next time you sit down for a meal, take your headphones off and mute the TV. Or find a movie where there's a lot of very audible chewing.

因此下次你再坐下来吃饭的时候，请拿下耳机调低电视的声音，或者你也可以放一部有许多咀嚼声的电影。