A study conducted on unsuspecting test subjects in an Illinois Hardee's found that people tend to consume less calories and have a slower rate of gluttony when it comes to food when the lights are low, and soft music is wafting from hidden speakers.

According to study authors Brian Wansink from Cornella nd Koert Van Ittersum from the Georgia Institute of Technology, they softend lights, played some soft tunes and classed up a corner of
 their Hardee's laboratory to find that patrons that ate in the more elegant section of the restaurant consumed 18 percent fewer calories than people sitting in an unaltered section,

Wansink and Van Ittersum argue that bright lights and colors coupled with onerous pop music make people freak out and tamp a lot more food down their gullets in a vain effort to cope with the sensory stress.

"Spending that extra time eating a little more slowly," explained Wansink, author of the book Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More than We Think, "at a more relaxed pace made a world of difference, not just to how much they ate but how much they liked it."

Could the experiment show how much the environment effects how people consume food? And could this lead to a new way of "eating less" / "dieting"?

[MSN]