Monday, December 31, 2012
Aerobic Exercise Best Way To Burn Fat, Not Weights
Aerobic exercise has been ruled the best type of exercise for eliminating fat, according to a study by a group of experts from Duke University who explored the comparison between resistance training and aerobic training. This study, published in the Journal of Applied Physiology, is the biggest randomized trial to measure revisions in body composition from three different types of exercise in overweight adults who do not have diabetes.
Aerobic exercise, commonly know as "cardio", including running, walking, and swimming, has historically been established as a good way to lose weight. Recently, however, recommendations have pointed out that resistance training, such as weight lifting to build and perpetuate muscle mass, could also contribute to weight loss via boosting a person's resting metabolic level.
An earlier study conducted by researchers at the University of Minnesota suggested that breast cancer survivors receive more benefits from weight training than from aerobic training. The researchers saw that strength training provided these participants with more help for their physical and emotional state than aerobic training.
Previous studies have shown health advantages for resistance training, such as improving glucose control. However, research on the effects of resistance training on fat mass have not had significant conclusions. Leslie H. Willis, MS, an exercise physiologist at Duke Medicine and the study's lead author explained, "Given that approximately two-thirds of adults in the United States are overweight due to excess body fat, we want to offer clear, evidence-based exercise recommendations that will truly help people lose weight and body fat."
The current study included 234 obese or overweight adults. Subjects were randomly given one of three exercise groups: aerobic training (nearly 12 miles per week), resistance training (three days per week of weight training, three sets per day, 8-12 repetitions per set), or aerobic and resistance training together (three days a week, three sets per day, 8-12 repetitions per set for resistance training, and around 12 miles per week of cardio). The exercise trainings were observed in order to accurately calculate how well the programs were followed by participants. From the study, 119 volunteers who finished their programs and had complete body composition data were examined to measure the effectiveness of each training program.
The aerobic training and the aerobic plus resistance training groups collectively lost more weight than those who completed only resistance training. The group doing only resistance training gained weight because of a boost in lean body mass.
Cardio exercise proved to be a more efficient type of exercise for losing body fat. The cardio group underwent an average of 133 minutes per week training and ended up losing weight. The resistance training group, on the other hand, spent around 180 minutes a week exercising without losing a pound.
The group participating in both resistance and aerobic training spent double the time training and ended with a blended outcome. The program aided in weight loss and fat mass loss, however, it did not decrease body mass or fat mass with just cardio exercise alone. The combination group showed the largest reduction in waist circumference, which may be explained by the amount of time the subjects exercised. Resting metabolic rate, which decides the amount of calories burned while resting, was not directly calculated during this study. Previous hypotheses suggest that weight training can improve metabolic rates, resulting in weight loss. In this specific study, resistance training did not reduce fat mass or body weight significantly, regardless of any differences in resting metabolic rate.
Willis added: "No one type of exercise will be best for every health benefit. However, it might be time to reconsider the conventional wisdom that resistance training alone can induce changes in body mass or fat mass due to an increase in metabolism, as our study found no change." The investigators said that exercise suggestions are age-specific. For example, older adults with muscle atrophy have been seen to improve with resistance training. Younger, healthy adults who desire to lose weight will benefit more from aerobic training. Cris A. Slentz, PhD, a Duke exercise physiologist and study co-author concluded:
"Balancing time commitments against health benefits, our study suggests that aerobic exercise is the best option for reducing fat mass and body mass. It's not that resistance training isn't good for you; it's just not very good at burning fat."
Small Changes In Eating Prompts Weight Loss
Making small easy changes to our eating habits on a consistent basis - 25 days or more per month - can lead to sustainable weight loss, according to research by Professor Brian Wansink in Cornell University's Food and Brand Lab. The challenge is to figure out which changes work for specific individuals and how to stick with changes long enough to make them second nature. To explore this issue, Cornell researchers launched the National Mindless Eating Challenge (NMEC), an online healthy eating and weight loss program that focused on simple eating behavior changes, instead of dieting.
NMEC participants, after answering questions about their eating goals, background and well-being, were sent three customized tips to follow for a month. All tips were founded on research and based on Wansink's book "Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More than We Think" (Bantam, 2006). Participants could download a checklist to track their adherence to tips and receive email reminders to keep them on track. At the end of each month they were expected to send in a follow-up survey. Of the 504 participants who completed at least one follow-up survey, more than two thirds (42 percent) either lost weight or maintained their weight (27 percent).
Weight loss was highest among people who made changes consistently.
Those whose adherence was 25 or more days per month reported an average monthly weight loss of 2 pounds, and those who stayed in the program at least three months and completed at least two follow-up surveys lost on average 1 percent of their initial weight. According to the study, which is published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Medical Internet Research (Nov-Dec., Vol. 14:6), common barriers that prevented people from making changes included personally unsuitable tips, forgetting, being too busy, unusual circumstances such as vacations and emotional eating.
"These results confirm that small, consistent changes in our daily eating behavior can result in gradual weight loss and in developing healthier eating habits," said Wansink, a marketing professor in Cornell's Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management.
Results of the study also show that it is a challenge for many people to stick to a program for a long period of time. For those who want to lose weight or eat more healthfully, the researchers conclude that finding an initial set of tips that are relevant and doable for an individual can be enough to learn the general principle.
"Later come up with your own changes and succeed at reaching your goal," Wansink said.
The NMEC participants said that the most effective tips they received were:
- Keep counters clear of all foods but the healthy ones.
- Never eat directly from a package - always portion food out onto a dish.
- Eat something hot for breakfast within the first hour of waking up.
- Avoid going more than thee or four hours without having something small to eat.
- Put down your utensils between bites to slow down your eating.
Monday, March 26, 2012
High-Fat, Low-Carb Diets Not for Obese People at Risk of Heart Attack
High-fat, low-carb foods are a popular choice for dieters, but new laboratory research by University of Alabama at Birmingham cardiologists indicates these may be detrimental to the health of people who have ischemic cardiovascular disease or a predisposition to heart attacks.
UAB cardiologist Steven Lloyd, M.D., Ph.D., will present the animal-model studies in four moderated poster sessions during the 2012 American College of Cardiology Scientific Sessions Sunday, March 25, 2012, in Chicago.
“Obesity and heart disease are major public health issues and are the leading causes of other disease — including diabetes, stroke and death,” Lloyd says. “Many overweight people turn to a high-fat, low-carb diet because of its effectiveness; but research has yet to adequately assess safety, and there is insufficient evidence to recommend them for people seeking to lose weight.”
Lloyd and colleagues first published in Life Sciences in 2008 that high-fat, low-carb diets affect the types of fuel the heart uses to function, alter insulin-signaling following a heart attack and increase post-heart-attack damage in normal-weight rats.
In this latest research, the team tested to learn if those findings would hold steadfast among obese rats and rats with heart disease.
“Overall, we found that obese rats fed a high-fat, low-carb diet — comparable to that humans would consume — had larger, more damaging and deadly heart attacks than rats fed the control diet,” Lloyd says. “Our findings also suggest that, at the cellular level, a high-fat, low-carb diet impaired recovery of heart function in obese rats immediately following a heart attack.”
Lloyd says that four studies are not definitive enough to say high-fat, low-carb diets are harmful or beneficial, but they do present enough preliminary evidence of harm to warrant further investigation.
“These findings tell us that for those who are trying to lose weight, if you have coronary artery disease or if for some reason you are at greater risk of having a heart attack, a high-fat, low-carb diet might not be a good thing for you,” Lloyd says.
The four presentations by Lloyd each answer different but connected questions:
• What is the effect of high-fat, low-carb diets on the size of a heart attack, and how well does the heart recovers after a cardiac event?
• What is the impact of high-fat, low-carb diets on heart attack size and survival in the immediate aftermath of a heart attack?
• What is the effect of high-fat, low-carb diets on mitochondrial function and oxidative stress in the heart, and how these affect tissue damage from reduced blood flow to the heart during an attack?
• How do high-fat, low-carb diets affect the heart’s insulin sensitivity and the fuels it uses to function during both normal function and during a heart attack?
Heart attack size and heart recovery
Lloyd and his colleagues fed obese rats either a control diet — which was a low-fat diet — or a high-fat, low-carb diet. The outcome for the obese rats was the same as described in normal-weight rats the 2008 — that type of diet leads to greater injury to the heart muscle and reduced functional recovery.
“Rat size did not matter,” Lloyd says. “The heart attacks in the obese rats — as in the normal weight rats — were much larger in those that ate a high-fat, low-carb diet and recovery of function was much better in those that ate the control diet than in those that at the high-fat, low-carb diet.”
Heart attack size and survival
Lloyd and his colleagues found that rats fed a high-fat, low-carb diet had greater damage to the heart muscle from a heart attack and were at greater risk of death from pump failure and arrhythmias when compared to the rats fed the control diet.
“The majority of the rats on the high-fat, low-carb diet didn’t survive the initial attack; among those that did survive, the attack size was considerably larger than among rats fed the control diet,” Lloyd says. “And many rats that died during the attack did so because of an arrhythmia. This could be attributed to the size of the attack.”
Oxidative stress
Lloyd says research has shown that oxidative stress during heart attacks plays a role in activating different chemical processes that cause cell death during and after blood flow is restricted to the heart. These chemical processes can last for a few hours or days after normal blood flow returns and be extremely damaging to the heart muscle.
Previous research also has linked high-fat diets to oxidative stress in the brain, causing cognitive impairment, and in the liver, causing fatty liver disease. Lloyd and his colleagues wanted to assess the affect of a high-fat, low-carb diet on mitochondrial function and oxidative stress in the heart and its subsequent affect on tissue during a heart attack.
“Obese rats fed the high-fat, low-carb diet had significantly larger heart attacks than those fed the control diet and had much more difficulty recovering function after blood flow was restored to the heart,” Lloyd says. “This might be partly due to a loss in the number of mitochondria in heart muscle cells, and an increase in formation of proteins that led to high oxidant stress, and a decrease in proteins that reduce oxidant stress. We found that all of these factors occur in rats fed the high-fat, low-carb diet. This could definitely be contributing to the harmful process of a heart attack.”
Insulin sensitivity
The primary fuel for the body is carbohydrates broken down into glucose. Once glucose is created, insulin then causes cells in muscle and other tissues to take up glucose from the blood and use it for energy. When someone eats a high-fat, low-carb diet, the body — including the heart — turns to fat as its next source of fuel. Ketones are molecules generated during fat metabolism. Lloyd says though research has shown the heart muscle can use many sources of fuel for energy, not all of them are as efficient. Glucose, or carbohydrates, tend to be the most efficient fuel when the heart is trying to recover from a damaging event.
“We found that a high-fat, low-carb diet impaired cardiac tissue response to insulin, which is known to be important in protecting the heart immediately after a heart attack, as it helps limit the size of a heart attack and protects muscle tissue,” Lloyd says. “We also found that, while the heart easily uses more ketones to function under normal conditions when the rats were fed a high-fat, low-carb diet, following a heart attack it uses less ketones. While it is unclear why this happens, without utilizing the most efficient fuel — carbohydrates — to the fullest extent, the heart is less efficient at recovering function.”
Lloyd says by no means does this research say no one should be on a high-fat, low-carb diet. In fact, these diets have been shown to improve certain markers in cholesterol profiles and they do help people lose weight. What it does say, he says, is that much more investigation is needed into the benefits and risks of a high-fat, low-carb diet.
“Right now, if I were considering a high-fat, low-carb diet, I would ask myself if the benefits outweigh the heart-attack issues this research has revealed,” he says. “If I had heart disease or I was predisposed to having a heart attack, I would think carefully before starting this type of diet.”
Ω
UAB cardiologist Steven Lloyd, M.D., Ph.D., will present the animal-model studies in four moderated poster sessions during the 2012 American College of Cardiology Scientific Sessions Sunday, March 25, 2012, in Chicago.
“Obesity and heart disease are major public health issues and are the leading causes of other disease — including diabetes, stroke and death,” Lloyd says. “Many overweight people turn to a high-fat, low-carb diet because of its effectiveness; but research has yet to adequately assess safety, and there is insufficient evidence to recommend them for people seeking to lose weight.”
Lloyd and colleagues first published in Life Sciences in 2008 that high-fat, low-carb diets affect the types of fuel the heart uses to function, alter insulin-signaling following a heart attack and increase post-heart-attack damage in normal-weight rats.
In this latest research, the team tested to learn if those findings would hold steadfast among obese rats and rats with heart disease.
“Overall, we found that obese rats fed a high-fat, low-carb diet — comparable to that humans would consume — had larger, more damaging and deadly heart attacks than rats fed the control diet,” Lloyd says. “Our findings also suggest that, at the cellular level, a high-fat, low-carb diet impaired recovery of heart function in obese rats immediately following a heart attack.”
Lloyd says that four studies are not definitive enough to say high-fat, low-carb diets are harmful or beneficial, but they do present enough preliminary evidence of harm to warrant further investigation.
“These findings tell us that for those who are trying to lose weight, if you have coronary artery disease or if for some reason you are at greater risk of having a heart attack, a high-fat, low-carb diet might not be a good thing for you,” Lloyd says.
The four presentations by Lloyd each answer different but connected questions:
• What is the effect of high-fat, low-carb diets on the size of a heart attack, and how well does the heart recovers after a cardiac event?
• What is the impact of high-fat, low-carb diets on heart attack size and survival in the immediate aftermath of a heart attack?
• What is the effect of high-fat, low-carb diets on mitochondrial function and oxidative stress in the heart, and how these affect tissue damage from reduced blood flow to the heart during an attack?
• How do high-fat, low-carb diets affect the heart’s insulin sensitivity and the fuels it uses to function during both normal function and during a heart attack?
Heart attack size and heart recovery
Lloyd and his colleagues fed obese rats either a control diet — which was a low-fat diet — or a high-fat, low-carb diet. The outcome for the obese rats was the same as described in normal-weight rats the 2008 — that type of diet leads to greater injury to the heart muscle and reduced functional recovery.
“Rat size did not matter,” Lloyd says. “The heart attacks in the obese rats — as in the normal weight rats — were much larger in those that ate a high-fat, low-carb diet and recovery of function was much better in those that ate the control diet than in those that at the high-fat, low-carb diet.”
Heart attack size and survival
Lloyd and his colleagues found that rats fed a high-fat, low-carb diet had greater damage to the heart muscle from a heart attack and were at greater risk of death from pump failure and arrhythmias when compared to the rats fed the control diet.
“The majority of the rats on the high-fat, low-carb diet didn’t survive the initial attack; among those that did survive, the attack size was considerably larger than among rats fed the control diet,” Lloyd says. “And many rats that died during the attack did so because of an arrhythmia. This could be attributed to the size of the attack.”
Oxidative stress
Lloyd says research has shown that oxidative stress during heart attacks plays a role in activating different chemical processes that cause cell death during and after blood flow is restricted to the heart. These chemical processes can last for a few hours or days after normal blood flow returns and be extremely damaging to the heart muscle.
Previous research also has linked high-fat diets to oxidative stress in the brain, causing cognitive impairment, and in the liver, causing fatty liver disease. Lloyd and his colleagues wanted to assess the affect of a high-fat, low-carb diet on mitochondrial function and oxidative stress in the heart and its subsequent affect on tissue during a heart attack.
“Obese rats fed the high-fat, low-carb diet had significantly larger heart attacks than those fed the control diet and had much more difficulty recovering function after blood flow was restored to the heart,” Lloyd says. “This might be partly due to a loss in the number of mitochondria in heart muscle cells, and an increase in formation of proteins that led to high oxidant stress, and a decrease in proteins that reduce oxidant stress. We found that all of these factors occur in rats fed the high-fat, low-carb diet. This could definitely be contributing to the harmful process of a heart attack.”
Insulin sensitivity
The primary fuel for the body is carbohydrates broken down into glucose. Once glucose is created, insulin then causes cells in muscle and other tissues to take up glucose from the blood and use it for energy. When someone eats a high-fat, low-carb diet, the body — including the heart — turns to fat as its next source of fuel. Ketones are molecules generated during fat metabolism. Lloyd says though research has shown the heart muscle can use many sources of fuel for energy, not all of them are as efficient. Glucose, or carbohydrates, tend to be the most efficient fuel when the heart is trying to recover from a damaging event.
“We found that a high-fat, low-carb diet impaired cardiac tissue response to insulin, which is known to be important in protecting the heart immediately after a heart attack, as it helps limit the size of a heart attack and protects muscle tissue,” Lloyd says. “We also found that, while the heart easily uses more ketones to function under normal conditions when the rats were fed a high-fat, low-carb diet, following a heart attack it uses less ketones. While it is unclear why this happens, without utilizing the most efficient fuel — carbohydrates — to the fullest extent, the heart is less efficient at recovering function.”
Lloyd says by no means does this research say no one should be on a high-fat, low-carb diet. In fact, these diets have been shown to improve certain markers in cholesterol profiles and they do help people lose weight. What it does say, he says, is that much more investigation is needed into the benefits and risks of a high-fat, low-carb diet.
“Right now, if I were considering a high-fat, low-carb diet, I would ask myself if the benefits outweigh the heart-attack issues this research has revealed,” he says. “If I had heart disease or I was predisposed to having a heart attack, I would think carefully before starting this type of diet.”
Ω
Thursday, March 22, 2012
The Smell of Food Affects How Much You Eat
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Bite size depends on the familiarly and texture of food. Smaller bite sizes are taken for foods which need more chewing and smaller bite sizes are often linked to a sensation of feeling fuller sooner. New research published in BioMed Central's new open access journal Flavour, shows that strong aromas lead to smaller bite sizes and suggests that aroma may be used as a means to control portion size.
The aroma experience of food is linked to its constituents and texture, but also to bite size. Smaller bites sizes are linked towards a lower flavour release which may explain why we take smaller bites of unfamiliar or disliked foods. In order to separate the effect of aroma on bite size from other food-related sensations researchers from the Netherlands developed a system where a custard-like dessert was eaten while different scents were simultaneously presented directly to the participants nose.
The results showed that the stronger the smell the smaller the bite. Dr Rene A de Wijk, who led the study, explained, "Our human test subjects were able to control how much dessert was fed to them by pushing a button. Bite size was associated with the aroma presented for that bite and also for subsequent bites (especially for the second to last bite). Perhaps, in keeping with the idea that smaller bites are associated with lower flavour sensations from the food and that, there is an unconscious feedback loop using bite size to regulate the amount of flavour experienced."
This study suggests that manipulating the odour of food could result in a 5-10% decrease in intake per bite. Combining aroma control with portion control could fool the body into thinking it was full with a smaller amount of food and aid weight loss.
Ω
Bite size depends on the familiarly and texture of food. Smaller bite sizes are taken for foods which need more chewing and smaller bite sizes are often linked to a sensation of feeling fuller sooner. New research published in BioMed Central's new open access journal Flavour, shows that strong aromas lead to smaller bite sizes and suggests that aroma may be used as a means to control portion size.
The aroma experience of food is linked to its constituents and texture, but also to bite size. Smaller bites sizes are linked towards a lower flavour release which may explain why we take smaller bites of unfamiliar or disliked foods. In order to separate the effect of aroma on bite size from other food-related sensations researchers from the Netherlands developed a system where a custard-like dessert was eaten while different scents were simultaneously presented directly to the participants nose.
The results showed that the stronger the smell the smaller the bite. Dr Rene A de Wijk, who led the study, explained, "Our human test subjects were able to control how much dessert was fed to them by pushing a button. Bite size was associated with the aroma presented for that bite and also for subsequent bites (especially for the second to last bite). Perhaps, in keeping with the idea that smaller bites are associated with lower flavour sensations from the food and that, there is an unconscious feedback loop using bite size to regulate the amount of flavour experienced."
This study suggests that manipulating the odour of food could result in a 5-10% decrease in intake per bite. Combining aroma control with portion control could fool the body into thinking it was full with a smaller amount of food and aid weight loss.
Ω
Tuesday, March 6, 2012
STUDY: MOST WEIGHT LOSS SUPPLEMENTS ARE NOT EFFECTIVE
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An Oregon State University researcher has reviewed the body of evidence around weight loss supplements and has bad news for those trying to find a magic pill to lose weight and keep it off – it doesn’t exist.
Melinda Manore reviewed the evidence surrounding hundreds of weight loss supplements, a $2.4 billion industry in the United States, and said no research evidence exists that any single product results in significant weight loss – and many have detrimental health benefits.
The study is online in the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism.
A few products, including green tea, fiber and low-fat dairy supplements, can have a modest weight loss benefit of 3-4 pounds (2 kilos), but it is important to know that most of these supplements were tested as part of a reduced calorie diet.
“For most people, unless you alter your diet and get daily exercise, no supplement is going to have a big impact,” Manore said.
Manore looked at supplements that fell into four categories: products such as chitosan that block absorption of fat or carbohydrates, stimulants such as caffeine or ephedra that increase metabolism, products such as conjugated linoleic acid that claim to change the body composition by decreasing fat, and appetite suppressants such as soluble fibers.
She found that many products had no randomized clinical trials examining their effectiveness, and most of the research studies did not include exercise. Most of the products showed less than a two-pound weight loss benefit compared to the placebo groups.
“I don’t know how you eliminate exercise from the equation,” Manore said. “The data is very strong that exercise is crucial to not only losing weight and preserving muscle mass, but keeping the weight off.”
Manore, professor of nutrition and exercise sciences at OSU, is on the Science Board for the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition. Her research is focused on the interaction of nutrition and exercise on health and performance.
“What people want is to lose weight and maintain or increase lean tissue mass,” Manore said. “There is no evidence that any one supplement does this. And some have side effects ranging from the unpleasant, such as bloating and gas, to very serious issues such as strokes and heart problems.”
As a dietician and researcher, Manore said the key to weight loss is to eat whole grains, fruits, vegetables and lean meats, reduce calorie intake of high-fat foods, and to keep moving. Depending on the individual, increasing protein may be beneficial (especially for those trying to not lose lean tissue), but the only way to lose weight is to make a lifestyle change.
“Adding fiber, calcium, protein and drinking green tea can help,” Manore said. “But none of these will have much effect unless you exercise and eat fruits and vegetables.”
Manore’s general guidelines for a healthy lifestyle include:
- Do not leave the house in the morning without having a plan for dinner. Spontaneous eating often results in poorer food choices.
- If you do eat out, start your meal with a large salad with low-calorie dressing or a broth-based soup. You will feel much fuller and are less likely to eat your entire entrée. Better yet: split your entrée with a dining companion or just order an appetizer in addition to your soup or salad.
- Find ways to keep moving, especially if you have a sedentary job. Manore said she tries to put calls on speaker phone so she can walk around while talking. During long meetings, ask if you can stand or pace for periods so you don’t remain seated the entire time
- Put vegetables into every meal possible. Shred vegetables into your pasta sauce, add them into meat or just buy lots of bags of fruits/vegetables for on-the-go eating.
- Increase your fiber. Most Americans don’t get nearly enough fiber. When possible, eat “wet” sources of fiber rather than dry – cooked oatmeal makes you feel fuller than a fiber cracker.
- Make sure to eat whole fruits and vegetables instead of drinking your calories. Eat an apple rather than drink apple juice. Look at items that seem similar and eat the one that physically takes up more space. For example, eating 100 calories of grapes rather than 100 calories of raisins will make you feel fuller.
- Eliminate processed foods. Manore said research increasingly shows that foods that are harder to digest (such as high fiber foods) have a greater “thermic effect” – or the way to boost your metabolism.
An Oregon State University researcher has reviewed the body of evidence around weight loss supplements and has bad news for those trying to find a magic pill to lose weight and keep it off – it doesn’t exist.
Melinda Manore reviewed the evidence surrounding hundreds of weight loss supplements, a $2.4 billion industry in the United States, and said no research evidence exists that any single product results in significant weight loss – and many have detrimental health benefits.
The study is online in the International Journal of Sport Nutrition and Exercise Metabolism.
A few products, including green tea, fiber and low-fat dairy supplements, can have a modest weight loss benefit of 3-4 pounds (2 kilos), but it is important to know that most of these supplements were tested as part of a reduced calorie diet.
“For most people, unless you alter your diet and get daily exercise, no supplement is going to have a big impact,” Manore said.
Manore looked at supplements that fell into four categories: products such as chitosan that block absorption of fat or carbohydrates, stimulants such as caffeine or ephedra that increase metabolism, products such as conjugated linoleic acid that claim to change the body composition by decreasing fat, and appetite suppressants such as soluble fibers.
She found that many products had no randomized clinical trials examining their effectiveness, and most of the research studies did not include exercise. Most of the products showed less than a two-pound weight loss benefit compared to the placebo groups.
“I don’t know how you eliminate exercise from the equation,” Manore said. “The data is very strong that exercise is crucial to not only losing weight and preserving muscle mass, but keeping the weight off.”
Manore, professor of nutrition and exercise sciences at OSU, is on the Science Board for the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition. Her research is focused on the interaction of nutrition and exercise on health and performance.
“What people want is to lose weight and maintain or increase lean tissue mass,” Manore said. “There is no evidence that any one supplement does this. And some have side effects ranging from the unpleasant, such as bloating and gas, to very serious issues such as strokes and heart problems.”
As a dietician and researcher, Manore said the key to weight loss is to eat whole grains, fruits, vegetables and lean meats, reduce calorie intake of high-fat foods, and to keep moving. Depending on the individual, increasing protein may be beneficial (especially for those trying to not lose lean tissue), but the only way to lose weight is to make a lifestyle change.
“Adding fiber, calcium, protein and drinking green tea can help,” Manore said. “But none of these will have much effect unless you exercise and eat fruits and vegetables.”
Manore’s general guidelines for a healthy lifestyle include:
- Do not leave the house in the morning without having a plan for dinner. Spontaneous eating often results in poorer food choices.
- If you do eat out, start your meal with a large salad with low-calorie dressing or a broth-based soup. You will feel much fuller and are less likely to eat your entire entrée. Better yet: split your entrée with a dining companion or just order an appetizer in addition to your soup or salad.
- Find ways to keep moving, especially if you have a sedentary job. Manore said she tries to put calls on speaker phone so she can walk around while talking. During long meetings, ask if you can stand or pace for periods so you don’t remain seated the entire time
- Put vegetables into every meal possible. Shred vegetables into your pasta sauce, add them into meat or just buy lots of bags of fruits/vegetables for on-the-go eating.
- Increase your fiber. Most Americans don’t get nearly enough fiber. When possible, eat “wet” sources of fiber rather than dry – cooked oatmeal makes you feel fuller than a fiber cracker.
- Make sure to eat whole fruits and vegetables instead of drinking your calories. Eat an apple rather than drink apple juice. Look at items that seem similar and eat the one that physically takes up more space. For example, eating 100 calories of grapes rather than 100 calories of raisins will make you feel fuller.
- Eliminate processed foods. Manore said research increasingly shows that foods that are harder to digest (such as high fiber foods) have a greater “thermic effect” – or the way to boost your metabolism.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Top Off Breakfast with -- Chocolate Cake?
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A full breakfast that includes a sweet dessert contributes to weight loss success
When it comes to diets, cookies and cake are off the menu. Now, in a surprising discovery, researchers from Tel Aviv University have found that dessert, as part of a balanced 600-calorie breakfast that also includes proteins and carbohydrates, can help dieters to lose more weight — and keep it off in the long run.
They key is to indulge in the morning, when the body's metabolism is at its most active and we are better able to work off the extra calories throughout the day, say Prof. Daniela Jakubowicz, Dr. Julio Wainstein and Dr. Mona Boaz of Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine and the Diabetes Unit at Wolfson Medical Center, and Prof. Oren Froy of Hebrew University Jerusalem.
Attempting to avoid sweets entirely can create a psychological addiction to these same foods in the long-term, explains Prof. Jakubowicz. Adding dessert items to breakfast can control cravings throughout the rest of the day. Over the course of a 32 week-long study, detailed in the journal Steroids, participants who added dessert to their breakfast — cookies, cake, or chocolate — lost an average of 40 lbs. more than a group that avoided such foods. What's more, they kept off the pounds longer.
The scale tells the tale
A meal in the morning provides energy for the day's tasks, aids in brain functioning, and kick-starts the body's metabolism, making it crucial for weight loss and maintenance. And breakfast is the meal that most successfully regulates ghrelin, the hormone that increases hunger, explains Prof. Jakubowicz. While the level of ghrelin rises before every meal, it is suppressed most effectively at breakfast time.
Basing their study on this fact, the researchers hoped to determine whether meal time and composition impacted weight loss in the short and long term, says Prof. Jakubowicz, or if it was a simple matter of calorie count.
One hundred and ninety three clinically obese, non-diabetic adults were randomly assigned to one of two diet groups with identical caloric intake — the men consumed 1600 calories per day and the women 1400. However, the first group was given a low carbohydrate diet including a small 300 calorie breakfast, and the second was given a 600 calorie breakfast high in protein and carbohydrates, always including a dessert item (i.e. chocolate).
Halfway through the study, participants in both groups had lost an average of 33 lbs. per person. But in the second half of the study, results differed drastically. The participants in the low-carbohydrate group regained an average of 22 lbs. per person, but participants in the group with a larger breakfast lost another 15 lbs. each. At the end of the 32 weeks, those who had consumed a 600 calorie breakfast had lost an average of 40 lbs. more per person than their peers.
Realistic in the long run
One of the biggest challenges that people face is keeping weight off in the long-term, says Prof. Jakubowicz. Ingesting a higher proportion of our daily calories at breakfast makes sense. It’s not only good for body function, but it also alleviates cravings. Highly restrictive diets that forbid desserts and carbohydrates are initially effective, but often cause dieters to stray from their food plans as a result of withdrawal-like symptoms. They wind up regaining much of the weight they lost during the diet proper.
Though they consumed the same daily amount of calories, "the participants in the low carbohydrate diet group had less satisfaction, and felt that they were not full," she says, noting that their cravings for sugars and carbohydrates were more intense and eventually caused them to cheat on the diet plan. "But the group that consumed a bigger breakfast, including dessert, experienced few if any cravings for these foods later in the day."
Ultimately, this shows that a diet must be realistic to be adopted as part of a new lifestyle. Curbing cravings is better than deprivation for weight loss success, Prof. Jakubowicz concludes.
A full breakfast that includes a sweet dessert contributes to weight loss success
When it comes to diets, cookies and cake are off the menu. Now, in a surprising discovery, researchers from Tel Aviv University have found that dessert, as part of a balanced 600-calorie breakfast that also includes proteins and carbohydrates, can help dieters to lose more weight — and keep it off in the long run.
They key is to indulge in the morning, when the body's metabolism is at its most active and we are better able to work off the extra calories throughout the day, say Prof. Daniela Jakubowicz, Dr. Julio Wainstein and Dr. Mona Boaz of Tel Aviv University's Sackler Faculty of Medicine and the Diabetes Unit at Wolfson Medical Center, and Prof. Oren Froy of Hebrew University Jerusalem.
Attempting to avoid sweets entirely can create a psychological addiction to these same foods in the long-term, explains Prof. Jakubowicz. Adding dessert items to breakfast can control cravings throughout the rest of the day. Over the course of a 32 week-long study, detailed in the journal Steroids, participants who added dessert to their breakfast — cookies, cake, or chocolate — lost an average of 40 lbs. more than a group that avoided such foods. What's more, they kept off the pounds longer.
The scale tells the tale
A meal in the morning provides energy for the day's tasks, aids in brain functioning, and kick-starts the body's metabolism, making it crucial for weight loss and maintenance. And breakfast is the meal that most successfully regulates ghrelin, the hormone that increases hunger, explains Prof. Jakubowicz. While the level of ghrelin rises before every meal, it is suppressed most effectively at breakfast time.
Basing their study on this fact, the researchers hoped to determine whether meal time and composition impacted weight loss in the short and long term, says Prof. Jakubowicz, or if it was a simple matter of calorie count.
One hundred and ninety three clinically obese, non-diabetic adults were randomly assigned to one of two diet groups with identical caloric intake — the men consumed 1600 calories per day and the women 1400. However, the first group was given a low carbohydrate diet including a small 300 calorie breakfast, and the second was given a 600 calorie breakfast high in protein and carbohydrates, always including a dessert item (i.e. chocolate).
Halfway through the study, participants in both groups had lost an average of 33 lbs. per person. But in the second half of the study, results differed drastically. The participants in the low-carbohydrate group regained an average of 22 lbs. per person, but participants in the group with a larger breakfast lost another 15 lbs. each. At the end of the 32 weeks, those who had consumed a 600 calorie breakfast had lost an average of 40 lbs. more per person than their peers.
Realistic in the long run
One of the biggest challenges that people face is keeping weight off in the long-term, says Prof. Jakubowicz. Ingesting a higher proportion of our daily calories at breakfast makes sense. It’s not only good for body function, but it also alleviates cravings. Highly restrictive diets that forbid desserts and carbohydrates are initially effective, but often cause dieters to stray from their food plans as a result of withdrawal-like symptoms. They wind up regaining much of the weight they lost during the diet proper.
Though they consumed the same daily amount of calories, "the participants in the low carbohydrate diet group had less satisfaction, and felt that they were not full," she says, noting that their cravings for sugars and carbohydrates were more intense and eventually caused them to cheat on the diet plan. "But the group that consumed a bigger breakfast, including dessert, experienced few if any cravings for these foods later in the day."
Ultimately, this shows that a diet must be realistic to be adopted as part of a new lifestyle. Curbing cravings is better than deprivation for weight loss success, Prof. Jakubowicz concludes.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Right size/ color of your bowls and plates could help you eat less
Using contrasting colors to reduce serving sizes and lose weight
Choosing the right size and color of your bowls and plates could help you eat less, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research.
"The bigger your dinnerware, the bigger your portion. If you use larger plates, you could end up serving 9 percent to 31 percent more than you typically would," write authors Koert van Ittersum (Georgia Institute of Technology) and Brian Wansink (Cornell University). The average size of dinner plates has increased by almost 23 percent from since 1900, the authors point out, and eating only 50 more calories a day could result in a five-pound weight gain each year.
In one lab experiment, the researchers asked 225 student participants to pour a specified amount of tomato soup into one of seven different sized bowls: three smaller, three larger, and one control bowl. Consistent with researchers' expectations, participants served less than the target serving size of soup into the smaller bowls, and they served more into the larger bowls.
Follow-up experiments showed that the "bowl bias" is nearly impossible to eliminate with education, awareness, or practice. During two summer camps, larger bowls led people to overserve up to 31 percent more than normal.
One of the few ways to reduce bowl bias is through color––such as changing the color of a tablecloth or a plate. In a field study, participants were asked to serve white-sauce or red-sauce pasta on either a large white or a large red plate. On average, changing the color of the plate so it was high contrast reduced how much people served by 21 percent, and changing the color of the tablecloth reduced how much people served by 10 percent.
The study reinforces the little-known Delboeuf illusion, where people believe the size of a circle is much smaller when surrounded by a large circle than a small one. Likewise, when serving onto a small plate, the serving size looks relatively larger than it actually is, which leads people to underserve.
"In the midst of hard-wired perceptual biases, a straightforward action would be to simply eliminate large dinnerware––replace our larger bowls and plates with smaller ones or contrast ones," the authors conclude.
Choosing the right size and color of your bowls and plates could help you eat less, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research.
"The bigger your dinnerware, the bigger your portion. If you use larger plates, you could end up serving 9 percent to 31 percent more than you typically would," write authors Koert van Ittersum (Georgia Institute of Technology) and Brian Wansink (Cornell University). The average size of dinner plates has increased by almost 23 percent from since 1900, the authors point out, and eating only 50 more calories a day could result in a five-pound weight gain each year.
In one lab experiment, the researchers asked 225 student participants to pour a specified amount of tomato soup into one of seven different sized bowls: three smaller, three larger, and one control bowl. Consistent with researchers' expectations, participants served less than the target serving size of soup into the smaller bowls, and they served more into the larger bowls.
Follow-up experiments showed that the "bowl bias" is nearly impossible to eliminate with education, awareness, or practice. During two summer camps, larger bowls led people to overserve up to 31 percent more than normal.
One of the few ways to reduce bowl bias is through color––such as changing the color of a tablecloth or a plate. In a field study, participants were asked to serve white-sauce or red-sauce pasta on either a large white or a large red plate. On average, changing the color of the plate so it was high contrast reduced how much people served by 21 percent, and changing the color of the tablecloth reduced how much people served by 10 percent.
The study reinforces the little-known Delboeuf illusion, where people believe the size of a circle is much smaller when surrounded by a large circle than a small one. Likewise, when serving onto a small plate, the serving size looks relatively larger than it actually is, which leads people to underserve.
"In the midst of hard-wired perceptual biases, a straightforward action would be to simply eliminate large dinnerware––replace our larger bowls and plates with smaller ones or contrast ones," the authors conclude.
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Exercise Is Good for Your Waistline – But It’s a Writing Exercise
Is losing weight as simple as doing a 15-minute writing exercise? In a new study published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, women who wrote about their most important values, like close relationships, music, or religion, lost more weight over the next few months than women who did not have that experience.
“We have this need to feel self-integrity,” says Christine Logel of Renison University College at the University of Waterloo, who cowrote the new study with Geoffrey L. Cohen of Stanford University. When something threatens your sense that you’re a good person, like failing a test or having a fight with a friend, “We can buffer that self-integrity by reminding ourselves how much we love our children, for example,” she says.
For this study, the researchers recruited 45 female undergraduates who had a body mass index of 23 or higher. A body mass index of 18.5 to 24.9 is considered normal weight; 58% of the women were overweight or obese. Each woman was weighed, and was then given a list of important values, like creativity, politics, music, and relationships with friends and family members. Each woman ranked the values in order of how important they were to her. Then half the women were told to write for 15 minutes about the value that was most important to her. The other half, a control group, were told to write about why a value far down on their list might be important to someone else.
The women came back between one and four months later to be weighed again. Women who had written about an important value lost an average of 3.41 pounds, while women in the control group gained an average of 2.76 pounds, a pattern of weight gain that is typical for undergraduates.
“How we feel about ourselves can have a big effect,” Logel says. “We think it sort of kicks off a recursive process.” Maybe when one of the women who wrote about an important value went home that night, she felt good about herself and didn’t eat to make herself feel better. Then the next day snacking wasn’t as much of a habit, so she skipped it. Over a few months, that could make a real difference in her life.
Many studies have found that even briefly thinking about values can have a big effect on situations where people feel a threat to their integrity. For example, Cohen used the same technique on minority seventh-graders who were underperforming relative to their white peers. Those who did the exercise were still performing better years later.
It’s too soon to say whether this could work for everybody; the women in the study didn’t know that writing about values was supposed to help them live better (although they may have wondered why this psychology study required a weigh-in).
“My dream, and my research goal, is to get this to the point where people can do it deliberately to benefit themselves,” Logel says. In the meantime, she carries around a keychain that reminds her of a value that she considers to be important. And everyone else can do that, too. “There’s certainly no harm in taking time to reflect on important values and working activities you value into your daily life,” Logel says.
“We have this need to feel self-integrity,” says Christine Logel of Renison University College at the University of Waterloo, who cowrote the new study with Geoffrey L. Cohen of Stanford University. When something threatens your sense that you’re a good person, like failing a test or having a fight with a friend, “We can buffer that self-integrity by reminding ourselves how much we love our children, for example,” she says.
For this study, the researchers recruited 45 female undergraduates who had a body mass index of 23 or higher. A body mass index of 18.5 to 24.9 is considered normal weight; 58% of the women were overweight or obese. Each woman was weighed, and was then given a list of important values, like creativity, politics, music, and relationships with friends and family members. Each woman ranked the values in order of how important they were to her. Then half the women were told to write for 15 minutes about the value that was most important to her. The other half, a control group, were told to write about why a value far down on their list might be important to someone else.
The women came back between one and four months later to be weighed again. Women who had written about an important value lost an average of 3.41 pounds, while women in the control group gained an average of 2.76 pounds, a pattern of weight gain that is typical for undergraduates.
“How we feel about ourselves can have a big effect,” Logel says. “We think it sort of kicks off a recursive process.” Maybe when one of the women who wrote about an important value went home that night, she felt good about herself and didn’t eat to make herself feel better. Then the next day snacking wasn’t as much of a habit, so she skipped it. Over a few months, that could make a real difference in her life.
Many studies have found that even briefly thinking about values can have a big effect on situations where people feel a threat to their integrity. For example, Cohen used the same technique on minority seventh-graders who were underperforming relative to their white peers. Those who did the exercise were still performing better years later.
It’s too soon to say whether this could work for everybody; the women in the study didn’t know that writing about values was supposed to help them live better (although they may have wondered why this psychology study required a weigh-in).
“My dream, and my research goal, is to get this to the point where people can do it deliberately to benefit themselves,” Logel says. In the meantime, she carries around a keychain that reminds her of a value that she considers to be important. And everyone else can do that, too. “There’s certainly no harm in taking time to reflect on important values and working activities you value into your daily life,” Logel says.
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