What Your Eating Habits Can Reveal About Your Personality

Anoth­er ancient Greek heal­er, doc­tor and philoso­pher Hip­pocrates said we are what we eat. But it turns out that not only the choice of food mat­ters, but also how it enters our body. What behav­ioral rit­u­als are char­ac­ter­is­tic of a per­son?

For the first time, these ques­tions were asked by a researcher in the field of eat­ing behav­ior Juli­et Bogosyan. For 20 years, she observed the behav­ior of peo­ple while eat­ing and drew cer­tain con­clu­sions. Her ideas were sup­port­ed by some oth­er experts. Of course, their obser­va­tions can­not be called sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly proven facts, but they can give food for thought.

You eat very slowly

Such peo­ple enjoy every bite of food, and it seems that they are not in a hur­ry. They always fin­ish the meal last, but this does not both­er them at all.

Accord­ing to Juli­et Bogosyan, slow eaters like to be in con­trol. They know the price of life, and there­fore do not force events. Usu­al­ly such peo­ple are self-con­fi­dent, bal­anced and calm. They can put their own inter­ests above the inter­ests of oth­ers, for which they are some­times called self­ish. At work, they can just as slow­ly com­plete their tasks.

But the psy­chol­o­gist Julia Hormes notes that if peo­ple eat very slow­ly only some­times, this may be due to a break­down or depressed mood: “It is known that our mood affects the speed of food con­sump­tion”

You love trying new things

Adven­ture lovers are always look­ing for new, unique dish­es, love to cook and taste the exot­ic, and often offer gas­tro­nom­ic mas­ter­pieces to their acquain­tances.

From the point of view of psy­chol­o­gy, such a per­son is a thrill-seek­er, risk-averse. He can be advised to exer­cise a sense of pro­por­tion in rela­tion to oth­ers, not forc­ing any­one to eat food that he does not have a soul for or that is too exot­ic for him.

But inter­est­ing­ly, lovers of every­thing new in food are also open to new expe­ri­ences in life — they eas­i­ly go beyond their com­fort zone and are not afraid of exper­i­ments. Such peo­ple can work well in mul­ti­task­ing con­di­tions, but they may lack atten­tion to every­thing. And some­times they incor­rect­ly pri­or­i­tize tasks.

You finish your meal before everyone else

Usu­al­ly fast eaters fin­ish their meal when the oth­er par­tic­i­pants have not had time to eat even half of the food on the plate. Often the habit of eat­ing quick­ly is formed in child­hood, when adults do not like to wait and con­stant­ly rush the child.

At the same time, peo­ple who quick­ly fin­ish a meal are often ambi­tious, high­ly moti­vat­ed and pur­pose­ful, always open to new expe­ri­ences. But they can also be impa­tient.

You study the menu for a long time before placing an order.

There are peo­ple who read the menu flu­ent­ly and quick­ly place an order after see­ing the usu­al prod­ucts in the recipe. And there are those that approach the order “with feel­ing, with sense, with arrange­ment.” They study each ingre­di­ent of the pro­posed dish, con­sid­er their com­pat­i­bil­i­ty, proof­read the recipe and even, per­haps, think of some­thing of their own. It takes them a lot of time to place an order and they will not be in a hur­ry.

Despite the fact that a long choice of dish­es for a meal is a sign of inde­ci­sion, such peo­ple become excel­lent lead­ers, often becom­ing lead­ers.

You adapt to the pace of eating interlocutors

Peo­ple who can adjust the pace of eat­ing to the speed of eat­ing dish­es by oth­er par­tic­i­pants in the table have a high lev­el of adap­ta­tion. They can adapt to dif­fer­ent peo­ple and sit­u­a­tions, which comes in handy in life.

They are usu­al­ly friend­ly and out­go­ing, make friends eas­i­ly and are able to main­tain strong social bonds. This makes them pop­u­lar among like-mind­ed peo­ple. But their prob­lem may be that they put oth­er peo­ple’s pri­or­i­ties ahead of their own.

The feed rate depends on the workload

There are peo­ple who eat quick­ly when there is a lot of work to do, and very slow­ly when tasks can wait and every bite of food can be enjoyed.

Obser­va­tions show that such peo­ple have high orga­ni­za­tion­al skills: they like it when every­thing goes accord­ing to sched­ule. They are reli­able and you can rely on them for any task. They always get things done and right on time. How­ev­er, some­times they do not have enough free time for them­selves — due to a too busy work sched­ule or planned activ­i­ties for oth­ers.

Everything must be perfect on the table and on the plate.

Some peo­ple won’t start eat­ing until the table looks the way they want. The bread and fork should be to the right of the plate, and the knife to the left. There should be nap­kins in the cen­ter of the table, and a salt shak­er with salt and pep­per next to it.

Before start­ing to eat, such peo­ple cut the food into pieces that are con­ve­nient for them or sim­ply arrange the food on the plate accord­ing to some of their prin­ci­ples.

Accord­ing to experts, such peo­ple are always on the alert. They think about every step they take and know for sure that one action will pull anoth­er. At work, they work hard, but always dream big, wait­ing to move up the career lad­der. In rela­tion­ships, they like to date and choose part­ners with good “prospects”.

You are very picky about food

To sit at a table with such a per­son is moral­ly dif­fi­cult. He asks a lot of ques­tions, he is inter­est­ed in every ingre­di­ent includ­ed in the dish, he sim­ply does not eat much, and it is very dif­fi­cult to please him. When din­ing out, he tor­ments the wait­er with ques­tions, and then he can sim­ply leave with­out plac­ing an order.

Eat­ing Behav­ior Spe­cial­ist Juli­et Bogosyan I am sure that such peo­ple “thrive” when they are in their com­fort zone. They pre­fer to per­form only those tasks and assign­ments with which they are famil­iar inside and out. But they are also very curi­ous. Don’t be afraid to ask ques­tions and get answers.

How­ev­er, they need to at least occa­sion­al­ly devi­ate from the rules and try some­thing new. This way they can have an expe­ri­ence they like.

You can’t stand food mixing

There are peo­ple who can’t stand it if dif­fer­ent parts of a meal come togeth­er on a plate. Their pas­ta should lie a lit­tle fur­ther than the pat­ty, and the squash caviar should not touch the pas­ta. They adhere to the prin­ci­ples of “sep­a­rate nutri­tion” and want to be respect­ed.

Such peo­ple love clean­li­ness and order in every­thing. It is very impor­tant for them that every­thing is prop­er­ly orga­nized. How­ev­er, it is desir­able for them to learn how to find a com­pro­mise so that their com­pan­ions at the table do not think that a per­son has an obses­sion with food.

Conclusion

As men­tioned above, the descrip­tions of these eat­ing habits do not pur­port to be sci­en­tif­i­cal­ly accu­rate. But this is one of the ways to learn a lit­tle more about the inter­locu­tor with whom you are at the same table. And then — to draw con­clu­sions based on their own obser­va­tions. Enjoy your meal!

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