The computer is able to make the food appear as much as 50 percent larger or 33 percent smaller than its actual size.

To make the illusion even more convincing, the processor is able to make the person’s hand appear to be the same size as normal.

“By changing the size of the food and scaling it up we have shown that participants eat about 10 percent less over the course of a day,” Takuji Narumi, an assistant professor working on the project, told AFP.