How often do you find yourself studying, watching television or just hanging out with a snack in your hand? It is hard not to snack throughout the day, especially when a busy school schedule gets in the way of eating three regular, balanced meals a day. College students, along with generations below ours, are in a constant state of snacking.

The March 2, 2010 addition of the New York Times came out with an article about how younger generations tend to have more snacking cravings than regular. The Times states “a sweeping study of 31,337 children and adolescents released on Tuesday tracked snacking and meal trends from 1977 through 2006 using data from four national surveys.

On average, children reach for cookies, chips and other treats about three times a day, consuming nearly 600 daily calories from snacks. That’s an increase of 168 snack calories compared with what children ate in the late 1970s.”

Snacks are offered in multiple places around campus like the bookstore, Eagles Nest, Common Grounds and the Talon. It is so easy to pick up something sweet in between classes with the availability of flex. But instead of snacking, try eating five small meals a day. Eating five small meals a day instead of three large meals will help fight the urge to snack on unhealthy foods throughout the day.

“My underlying fear is that we’re moving away from being hungry and eating for satiation to just eating,” said Dr. Barry M. Popkin, director of nutrition epidemiology at the University of North Carolina in the Times article. “Food is there, and we eat.”

Eating food for entertainment instead of fueling the body is a way to gain unnecessary weight. If unhealthy snacking were replaced with foods like fruits and vegetables, then snacking would not be as bad.

Next time you want to have a snack, look at what you have eaten that day, look at when you ate it and ask yourself if you really need it. This is one way to become a more health conscious person and help your body stay well and fit.