During a long (longer than 11 minutes) meal and in a large company, children eat much better than usual – such a curious fact was discovered by Julie Lumeng and Katherine Hillman from the University of Michigan (USA), watching the lunches of preschoolers.
Surrounded by nine peers, each child eats an average of a third more than in a company of four people. Perhaps the fact is that after satisfying hunger, which takes about 11 minutes, the thirst for communication comes into force, and in order not to feel excluded from a complex group, children continue to eat. This is one of the reasons for a phenomenon familiar to many adults: at family dinners or formal receptions, we consume several times more food than usual.