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Long-term success rates by approach or type of diet?

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NorthCascades
NorthCascades Posts: 10,970 Member
in Debate Club
I keep hearing that 90+ % of people who lose weight gain it back. Usually it seems to mean people shouldn't bother trying to lose weight. Here's an example:
The results show, once again, Dr. Leibel said, that losing weight “is not a neutral event,” and that it is no accident that more than 90 percent of people who lose a lot of weight gain it back. “You are putting your body into a circumstance it will resist,” he said. “You are, in a sense, more metabolically normal when you are at a higher body weight.”

A solution might be to restore hormones to normal levels by giving drugs after dieters lose weight. But it is also possible, said Dr. Jules Hirsch of Rockefeller University, that researchers just do not know enough about obesity to prescribe solutions.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/27/health/biological-changes-thwart-weight-loss-efforts-study-finds.html

A lot of people take up crash diets that are obviously not sustainable, quit them, and gain back anything they've lost, sometimes with interest.

Other people take different approaches. Some use calorie counting over time to come to an understanding about energy balance or to change their ideas about portion sizes, then apply what they've learned going forward.

My question is whether there are statistics about weight regain, broken out by approach to weight loss. I feel like the 90+ % failure rate does not apply to people taking a slower and more sustainable approach, but I haven't been able to find much data to back that up.

This isn't really a debate topic (although I won't be surprised if it gets hijacked and becomes a debate) but I feel like people drawn to debate forums tend to be more interested in objective evidence, so I have a better chance of somebody having an answer here than in other sub forums.
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Replies

  • kgeyser
    kgeyser Posts: 22,505 Member
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    I'm not sure where the 90% failure rate comes from, but I'm also not sure where the belief that slower weight loss has a higher success rate comes from either. We certainly see plenty of posts from users who used MFP to help lose weight in the past and are back because they regained, and there are certainly people on this site who would be considered "success stories" who have gained back some of the weight (usually due to life circumstances) and are buckling down again to lose it. Obviously, this is a health and fitness site, so we are going to see posts like that, but that also means we're going to see a higher number of people who did manage to keep it off than in the general population, so we can't really extrapolate that the MFP method is necessarily superior either. I remember seeing an article around here somewhere comparing rate of loss to regain, but iirc, it didn't follow the participants long enough after the loss to be of any significance.
  • afatpersonwholikesfood
    afatpersonwholikesfood Posts: 577 Member
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    I don't have anything official to post here, but from reading and searching on the internet in the past, the approach or type of diet doesn't seem to matter - i.e. low carb or high carb or packaged meals or Weightwatchers. The rates remain the same. As for speed of loss, at least in people who start higher up on the scale, quick initial losses actually predicted more total loss at one year and greater compliance than slower losers. The study didn't go for years, though.
  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
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    Type of diet, rate of loss, etc, has no predictive value for long term outcome. Mainstream education about nutrition and healthy habits is useless at best, counterproductive at worst; telling people (in detail) what to do, without making sure they know why, and what they are doing, will make people aim for random goals, fail, and end up with even worse habits, just from the feelings of failure in such basic tasks as feeding oneself and move one's body.

    I think measuring and assessing people's attitudes is more difficult than dividing them into groups based on diet type and checking off boxes of single behaviors. But scientists can do that and I suppose it makes them feel they are doing something.
  • StealthHealth
    StealthHealth Posts: 2,417 Member
    edited July 2016
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    I would expect around 99.9% of people* who have gained weight have at some point lost weight.

    It is typical for newborns to lose weight in the first few days, so everyone over that age is a weight gainer but ha, in the past, lost weight.

    Not sure what my point is, other than: Statistics are weird and often paint a very strange picture.

  • Jeremyinstl
    Jeremyinstl Posts: 5 Member
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    I think for 1 there is so much Bro science out there it becomes fact to the masses.

    No body wants to lose 1 or 2 pounds a week. They want to lose 30 pounds in 30 days!

    Most people set them self's up to fail before they even start with unrealistic caloric restrictions that cant be sustained mentally or physically that lead to binge eating . No body is perfect and nobody had unlimited will power.

    I could go on and on :#

  • grannynot
    grannynot Posts: 146 Member
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    My question is whether there are statistics about weight regain, broken out by approach to weight loss. I feel like the 90+ % failure rate does not apply to people taking a slower and more sustainable approach, but I haven't been able to find much data to back that up.

    [/quote]

    I kind of doubt there are accurate statistics, since we're comparing humans and not something "uniform", like cars (or even domestic animals that eat the same food every day). I think all you can do is look at the longevity of something like Weight Watchers (slow and steady weight loss), for example, and assume that it works. I doubt, however, that WW has any data on how many people regain the weight they lost, simply because a LOT of people are too embarrassed to show up at a WW meeting after a significant weight gain? (Plus they might assume that WW "didn't work" for them)

  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    Vodka is not processed?
  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
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    "Processed" has no common definition, so it's a pretty useless term, anyway.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    I think processed does, although it is often used incorrectly. I actually get more confused by "highly processed." If I buy a wrap from Pret, is that highly processed? I'd assume so, but it can be (IMO) perfectly healthy and consistent with my goals and fit in my day just about as easily as something I'd pack for lunch myself, if not having a lazy morning.
  • grannynot
    grannynot Posts: 146 Member
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    jmf552 wrote: »
    But what I realized is that what really worked for me in WW is the tracking of daily intake of food. If I tracked, I lost, period. If I stopped tracking I gained. I like the tracking system here at MFP better and it's free. So that's my plan. WW has a saying I like, "If you bite it, write it!"

    It's funny too, I don't have that much of a problem meeting my diet tracking goals if I track. It's like a psychological "switch" that turns on. If I am paying attention to what I eat, I eat better and I eat less, without really trying.

    Same for me - I HATE to track calories (wanton eating is so much more *fun*!) - but now that I am, I've been very faithful and the pounds are slowly dropping. So I guess I'll be hanging around here for a while....LOL!

  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
    edited July 2016
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    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    I think processed does, although it is often used incorrectly. I actually get more confused by "highly processed." If I buy a wrap from Pret, is that highly processed? I'd assume so, but it can be (IMO) perfectly healthy and consistent with my goals and fit in my day just about as easily as something I'd pack for lunch myself, if not having a lazy morning.

    Ok, no common usage :p

    More important is - exactly what you are pointing to - the overall quality of the food and the overall quality of one's diet.
  • NorthCascades
    NorthCascades Posts: 10,970 Member
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    Thanks, everybody, for sharing your thoughts.

    I had hoped that the type of statistics I'm looking for (even if I can only vaguely describe them) existed somewhere and clever people would point me to them, but it looks like @kimny72 is right and they probably don't. The national weight control registry is fascinating, there's some good info in there, and everybody should have a look at it.
  • kommodevaran
    kommodevaran Posts: 17,890 Member
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    Now I'm pretty sure there's no research specifically on approach/attitude. Yoni Freedhoff talks about the weight registry here, at 33 minutes in:

    https://youtu.be/6FSyzNPoxDY?t=1982

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