Recent research shows what many of us knew all along: Our moods dictate what we eat. Researchers studied the diets of hundreds of people to show how personality and foods collide—how our moods may steer us to certain foods, based on their physical characteristics. The study theorized that many moods send specifics signals (for example, stressed adrenal glands could be sending salt-craving signals). So what does your favorite turn-to food say about you?

• If you crave tough foods, like meat, or hard and crunchy foods, you could be feeling angry.
• If you crave sugars, you could be feeling depressed.
• If you crave soft and sweet foods, like ice cream, you could be feeling anxious.
• If you crave salty foods, you could be stressed.
• If you crave bulky, fill-you-up foods, like crackers and pasta, you could be feeling lonely and sexually frustrated.
• If you crave anything and everything, you could be feeling jealous.

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Food cravings are fascinating, but they mean different things to men than to women.

According to French researchers who studied over 1000 people, "28% of women and 13% of men were food cravers. Cravers, especially women, were more frequently concerned about their weight than noncravers."

Women who crave, sadly, more often have negative feelings about indulging those feelings.  And  eat more because of it.  Men on the other hand, feel good about wanting to eat, and having done so.  Weird, perhaps.  But 40% of men and women who crave are not hungry.

So, most food cravings are from wanting food, instead of needing it. According to Chef Clinic research, when you want food, you are usually mad, sad, glad, lonely, depressed, or need a reward.  Not hungry.

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