Who you eat with may affect more than how much you enjoy a meal. It could also influence how your body responds to the food.
In a controlled experiment, researchers found that people had a smaller rise in blood sugar after eating the same carbohydrate-rich meal when a close social partner was nearby compared with when they ate alone. Their blood sugar also returned toward its starting level more quickly.
The finding is intriguing, but it doesn’t mean eating with someone else is a way to control blood sugar or prevent type 2 diabetes. The researchers looked at what happened after a single meal. They did not study whether regularly eating with other people leads to better blood sugar control or better health over time.
The study, published in Science Advances, was part of a larger investigation into whether being near people we are close to can influence how our bodies respond to everyday challenges.
“We used to think of the body as an isolated system that regulates itself,” said Shir Atzil, a professor at Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “Our findings show that human physiology is inherently social.”
For the eating portion of the research, participants ate the same standardized meal under different social conditions. That allowed researchers to compare their blood sugar responses without differences in the meal itself getting in the way.
When a close social partner was present, the rise in blood sugar was smaller and recovery was faster.
There are plenty of reasons not to read too much into that result. Blood sugar after a meal is affected by what and how much we eat, along with factors such as physical activity and individual health. This experiment suggests the social setting of a meal could be another piece of that puzzle, not that companionship outweighs those other factors.
It also doesn’t tell us that eating with just anyone would produce the same result. The study specifically looked at close social partners, making the relationship between the people an important part of the finding.
The researchers saw similar signs that social closeness could matter in other experiments involving cold and stressful situations. Together, the findings suggest that simply having a trusted person nearby may influence how the body responds to different experiences.
For nutrition research, the blood sugar experiment opens up an interesting area to explore. Studies of eating often concentrate on what people eat, how much they eat and when they eat. This research suggests there may be another question worth asking: Who are they eating with?
“Blood sugar regulation is not just about what we eat, but who we eat with,” Atzil said. “Our relationships have an active biological role in our physical wellbeing.”
That idea will need more research before it can be translated into health advice. A controlled experiment after one meal can show an immediate difference, but it cannot tell us whether that difference matters over months or years.
The study was supported by a European Research Council Starting Grant awarded to Shir Atzil. Atzil reported that she is exploring intellectual property protection related to potential applications of the “Social Physiology” concept developed in the research.