STUPID DIET MYTHS BUSTED!

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proats
proats Posts: 35 Member
in Food and Nutrition
Hello All,

As a new member here I would like to formally put together a list of silly diet myths and some peer-reviewed research papers that disputes them. Enjoy your stress-free life again!


MYTH#1: Eating Frequently "stokes" your metabolism and helps with fat loss.
WRONG!:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17413096
-This study compares 1 meal/d to 3 meal/d. In the experiment, subjects who only consumed 1 meal/d saw a decrease in fat mass, and the hormone cortisol.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8...ubmed_RVDocSum
-This shows no difference on the effects of 2 meals/d compared to 5 meals/d on DIT (diet induced- thermogenesis), BMR, and Energy Expenditure. Meaning, the 5 meals/d did not increase the metabolic rate.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19943985
-This study shows there was no difference in weight loss between subjects with high/low meal frequencies.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9155494
-Evidence supports that meal frequency has nothing to do with energy in the subjects.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11319656
-Yet again, no difference in energy in the subjects compared to 2 meals/d to 6 meals/d.


MYTH#2: Saturated Fat is BAD! It causes Cardiovascular Diesease (CV)
WRONG!:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2824152/
-This paper shows no link between Sat Fat and CV

http://www.ajcn.org/content/80/5/1102.full
-This paper shows that Sat Fat may actually PREVENT CV in women!


MYTH#3: Eating late at night (after 7pm, etc) causes fat gain.
WRONG!

There is a cumulation of a LOT of research found here that shows that eating a majority of your daily cals later at night eating may actually IMPROVE fat loss:
http://www.leangains.com/2011/06/is-late-night-eating-better-for-fat.html


All I ask you to do is PLEASE look into these for yourself and form your own opinions before jumping onto the next bandwago food-phobia trend!

Thanks for reading!
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Replies

  • emmaNEEDSskinny
    emmaNEEDSskinny Posts: 317
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    ive never believed any of these myths! especially the last one! :)
  • amandakoorime
    amandakoorime Posts: 26
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    Do you have a myth about eating sugar after 7 pm actually makes you gain more fat? Or even sugar from a healthy source leads to less fat than an unhealthy source (example: apple vs chocolate)?

    Just curious is all.
  • juliapurpletoes
    juliapurpletoes Posts: 951 Member
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    Love it thanks for your research! :bigsmile:
  • slynn777
    slynn777 Posts: 17
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    I always thought it wasn't when you ate, or how frequently you ate.....but always boils down to WHAT you ate.
  • proats
    proats Posts: 35 Member
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    Do you have a myth about eating sugar after 7 pm actually makes you gain more fat? Or even sugar from a healthy source leads to less fat than an unhealthy source (example: apple vs chocolate)?

    Just curious is all.

    Try not to think of food in terms of "healthy and unhealthy". Instead, focus on the fact that the body sees calories as calories, regardless of the source. A carb is a carb. A fat is a fat. Protein is protein.

    What you have to do is find out what your maintenance caloric intake is, then subtract ~10-15% for fat loss.
  • proats
    proats Posts: 35 Member
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    Love it thanks for your research! :bigsmile:

    You're welcome!

    My degree is in Molecular and Cellular Biology, research is what I do best, lol.
  • melizerd
    melizerd Posts: 870 Member
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    Good post! I'm a nursing student and we've done some info on how the body takes in and breaks down things we eat which only proves to me the "It's WHAT you eat, not when you eat it" mentality.

    I'm a horrible breakfast eater, there I said it!! But I've lost 71lbs in a year. Of course I'm pretty close to a real healthy weight now and it's slower coming off but it's still about WHAT I eat not when I eat it. So as long as we're eating healthy then it doesn't matter if it's 9am or 9pm :D

    I'm always surprised at the myths really intelligent people believe and will FIGHT you on that it's true (LOL).
  • mhazelip
    mhazelip Posts: 5 Member
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    You wouldn't happen to go to ASU would you?

    Definately like the diet myths post. I see too much bro-science in weight loss. Studies taken out of context, simply preverted, or a total lack of understanding of what a paticular study even said.

    While I agree with calories in vs calories out I also believe that a difference exists. The way the body prefers carbs over fat over protein for energy is the main reason why. So far I am having difficulty locating studies that show a comparison of equal calories yet different nutriet profiles. For instance 2000 calories with 60% protein 30% carb 10% fat vs 2000 calories with 60% carb 30% fat 10% protein. Would you happen to know of any?
  • proats
    proats Posts: 35 Member
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    Good post! I'm a nursing student and we've done some info on how the body takes in and breaks down things we eat which only proves to me the "It's WHAT you eat, not when you eat it" mentality.

    I'm a horrible breakfast eater, there I said it!! But I've lost 71lbs in a year. Of course I'm pretty close to a real healthy weight now and it's slower coming off but it's still about WHAT I eat not when I eat it. So as long as we're eating healthy then it doesn't matter if it's 9am or 9pm :D

    I'm always surprised at the myths really intelligent people believe and will FIGHT you on that it's true (LOL).

    Well said.

    Its actually even more like "HOW MUCH you eat, and not always WHAT you eat".

    But you are correct in the fact that really intelligent people will just blindly listen to nutritionists, personal trainers, etc (no hate on either of those professions) who are absolutely misinformed and full of outdated information.
  • proats
    proats Posts: 35 Member
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    You wouldn't happen to go to ASU would you?

    Definately like the diet myths post. I see too much bro-science in weight loss. Studies taken out of context, simply preverted, or a total lack of understanding of what a paticular study even said.

    While I agree with calories in vs calories out I also believe that a difference exists. The way the body prefers carbs over fat over protein for energy is the main reason why. So far I am having difficulty locating studies that show a comparison of equal calories yet different nutriet profiles. For instance 2000 calories with 60% protein 30% carb 10% fat vs 2000 calories with 60% carb 30% fat 10% protein. Would you happen to know of any?

    No sorry, not ASU.

    I don't have any off the top of my head, but I will say this about macronutrients and calories:

    You want to get:
    1.0-1.5g of PROTEIN per pound of lean BW
    0.45-1.0g of FAT per pound of lean BW
    fill the rest of the remaining calories with carbs (or any combination of the 3 macros)

    People often make the mistake of correlating dietary fat with sub-cutaneous fat.

    EATING FAT DOESNT MAKE YOU FAT! A long-term caloric excess makes you fat!
  • mhazelip
    mhazelip Posts: 5 Member
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    Very true. Also you point out that the calculation should be made upon Lean Body Mass. I think far too many folks assume that it should be made on total weight..

    If I find a study, which I doubt I will, I will post it to you.
  • juliapurpletoes
    juliapurpletoes Posts: 951 Member
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    bumping! a great RE-READ!
  • Babushka_Dolly
    Babushka_Dolly Posts: 114 Member
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    Thanks!!! Always nice to get silly myths bust!
  • Lyadeia
    Lyadeia Posts: 4,603 Member
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    I have never believed that eating smaller meals more often will speed up your metabolism. However, smaller meals more often keeps me less hungry through the day and I have less urges to binge. It keeps me from overeating. I actually have read earlier articles that support the 5 meals a day thing because of THIS reason, and it is only more recently that people have started to add to that believing that it increases metabolism to do so.

    I personally have less success losing weight eating less meals or larger meals because I am normally eating too many calories that way. Smaller more frequent meals helps me with portion sizes because I am not as hungry throughout the day any more, and I tend to eat fewer calories.

    And that time of day thing drives me crazy. I guess people like me who work third shift are all fatties because we eat at night, lol.
  • AmberYZ
    AmberYZ Posts: 23 Member
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    Eating multiple times throughout the day may not magically boost your metabolism, but I've always noticed that eating consistently keeps your energy levels up where as if you eat 1500 calories once and not eat for the next 12 hours at the end of the day you'll be exhausted. Less energy means you're motivated to do less and, as a result, burn less calories.
  • tigersword
    tigersword Posts: 8,059 Member
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    I can't say I've ever had that problem. I've had days where I know I'm not going to get time to eat, and load up my daily calories early, and I never have a crash.
  • lachicadelfuego
    lachicadelfuego Posts: 35 Member
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    Bump
  • RangerSteve
    RangerSteve Posts: 437
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    Eating multiple times throughout the day may not magically boost your metabolism, but I've always noticed that eating consistently keeps your energy levels up where as if you eat 1500 calories once and not eat for the next 12 hours at the end of the day you'll be exhausted. Less energy means you're motivated to do less and, as a result, burn less calories.

    Not necessarily. Our body produces hormones to deal with times of infrequent eating. Think about people 10,000 years ago. They usually ate after a long day of hunting/gathering without eating all day. People still live this way in a lot of areas in the world, specifically Africa. If people couldn't get energy from larger meals that were infrequent then people would have died off long ago. Instead, we have a hormone called glucagon that balances out blood sugar when we don't have food in our system. It's the opposite of insulin and works in the same fashion to keep our blood sugar levels steady when we can't eat. That is why a lot of people can have success on diets where they only eat twice a day.
  • proats
    proats Posts: 35 Member
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    Not necessarily. Our body produces hormones to deal with times of infrequent eating. Think about people 10,000 years ago. They usually ate after a long day of hunting/gathering without eating all day. People still live this way in a lot of areas in the world, specifically Africa. If people couldn't get energy from larger meals that were infrequent then people would have died off long ago. Instead, we have a hormone called glucagon that balances out blood sugar when we don't have food in our system. It's the opposite of insulin and works in the same fashion to keep our blood sugar levels steady when we can't eat. That is why a lot of people can have success on diets where they only eat twice a day.

    Very well said. Its hard to ignore the molecular evolutionary advantages we have had to develop while dealing with not having anything to eat for days at a time.

    We would have never survived as a species if our "optimum" eating schedule was a frequent one.
  • glitterpiss
    glitterpiss Posts: 113
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    melizerd, high five for nursing students! :D

    I went to a family BBQ today and an uncle was talking about this really good book about negative calorie foods and how awesome they are and how they made him lose a ton of weight and how everyone should buy the book. It made me giggle.

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