Here is an experiment requiring no equipment, costing nothing, and mildly terrifying to modern households: one week of dinners without screens. The attention research predicts specific changes — more taste, better fullness reading, actual conversation. The week confirms them faster than expected.

The Attention Science

Distracted eating measurably increases intake and decreases meal memory — screen-watchers eat more AND report less satisfaction (the brain that missed the meal orders a snack later to compensate). Attention is a satiety ingredient. The research is unusually unanimous.

The Experiment Protocol

Seven dinners, screens in another room (the stack-by-the-door ritual for households — the physical distance matters; face-down on the table still whispers), music legal, conversation optional but statistically inevitable by day three.

The Predicted Timeline

Days one-two: phantom-phone awkwardness, weirdly long-feeling meals (they are the same length; attention stretched them). Days three-four: food starts tasting louder, someone tells an actual story. Days five-seven: the table develops a culture. The awkwardness was withdrawal, and it passes.

The Keep-What-Works Ending

Post-experiment, most households keep a version: screen-free weeknights with movie-dinner Fridays, or the twenty-minute minimum before screens return. Purity is not the goal — the discovery is: dinner was a daily meeting of your actual life, double-booked for years. The experiment just cleared the calendar once.

Seven screenless dinners, stacked phones, louder food, accidental conversation. The table was always broadcasting — the week just turned off the competing channel long enough to notice.