(STUDY FINDS) — The size of your pretzel not only impacts how quickly you eat it, but how many salty treats you end up eating, according to Penn State researchers. With almost a quarter of daily calories in the United States coming from snack foods, these findings may help deepen the understanding of how eating patterns affect calorie and sodium intake.
A team of food scientists explored how the size of pretzels affects overall intake, eating rate, bite size, and how much time you spend snacking. The study revealed that people eat larger pretzels quicker and with larger bites. The opposite was true for smaller pretzels. However, despite eating less and taking smaller bites, these tiny pretzel eaters still consumed more salt.
There were 75 adults who participated in the study who ate three different times. The oversized snack was nearly 2.5 servings and came in one of three sizes of pretzel: small, medium, or large. The researchers video-recorded each snacking session to calculate the rate and bite size and measured how much each participant ate in terms of both weight and calories.
