5 ms·

Increased food intake alone explains the increase in body weight in US

26 points by ph0rque 18y ago

binarycheese 18y ago
So HFCS has nothing to do with it? HFSC - High Fructose Corn Syrup
- Retric 18y ago
  One thery for the issue with HFSC(?HFCS) is they reduce the body's ability to measure how many calories it has consumed which promotes over eating. The other problem is they tend to be in high calory low nutrition food so people need to still need to eat nutrent food and the "empty callories" don't really help. PS: While I have never heard much mention of this, I suspect people crave food that contain nutrents they are missing. So hunger is probably a fiarly complex system that might not be all that robust to "new" food types.
  - triplefox 18y ago
    My personal experience with this bears it out; an HFCS soda will be consumed quickly (and I feel unsatisfied) but a sugar one is better to sip through, and I get a better sense of its impact as well.
- mdasen 18y ago
  HFCS might be a contributor, but would simply show up as an increase in energy intake. If you go from eating X amount of sugars in a day to eating 2X amount of sugars in a day, that just shows up as an increase in caloric intake. This article was trying to contrast energy intake with exercise to see if the obesity seen was being caused by an increase in the amount we ate or a decrease in the amount we exercised (rather than seeing what foods might have been the culprits of the increased energy intake).
kingkongrevenge 18y ago
Taken at face value this only invites the question Why are people eating more? I think a good answer is reduced dietary fat, which sates, and increased starch and sugar intake, which screw up insulin levels leading to regular hunger pangs.
- thras 18y ago
  Indeed. I take it you've read Gary Taubes' "Good Calories Bad Calories"? Overfeeding studies show that it's very hard to get people to gain weight on protein diets. Carbohydrate overfeeding, on the other hand, can get up to 10,000 calories a day, and people will still complain about feeling hungry. Our ancestors had lots of dietary fat. They didn't have any simple carbohydrates at all.
  - sergeo 18y ago
    A recent multi-year study published in The New England Journal of Medicine (abstract: http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/short/360/9/859 http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/short/360/9/859 , full text is also available there) concludes that "Reduced-calorie diets result in clinically meaningful weight loss regardless of which macronutrients they emphasize." 811 overweight adults were randomly assigned to one of four diets: percentages of energy derived from fat, protein, and carbohydrates were 20, 15, and 65%; 20, 25, and 55%; 40, 15, and 45%; and 40, 25, and 35%. By 2 years, weight loss remained similar in all four groups - about 7 lbs. Among the 80% who completed the trial, the average weight loss was 4 kg; 14 to 15% of the participants had a reduction of at least 10% of their initial body weight. Satiety, hunger, satisfaction with the diet, and attendance at group sessions were similar for all diets. Attendance of counseling groups was strongly associated with weight loss (0.2 kg per session attended). Bottom line: 1. It's all about eating less - eat what you like (so you can stick to it for life). As long your calories are reduced (to lose a pound of fat you need to lose 3,500 calories) and you stay within healthy nutrient ranges you will lose weight. 2. Consider participation in some sort of community (or even online groups), for support, motivation and accountability.
    - latortuga 18y ago
Femur 18y ago
Food != Calories The featured article examines calorie intake and not food intake. A pound of apples has a much lower calorie density than a pound of french fries. Changes in the TYPE of food consumed (i.e. increase calorie density) agree with the featured article's conclusions.
- chancho 18y ago
  I don't see where anyone got this confused.
  - Femur 18y ago
    The title of this HN posting is "Increased food intake alone explains the increase in body weight in US" That is not true. It is "Increased CALORIE intake alone explains the increase in body weight in US"
    - chancho 18y ago
      I don't know about you, but I appreciate posters who copy article titles verbatim instead of editorializing. As for the article itself, it very clearly stated that increased energy intake was the culprit. The word "food" by itself does not indicate a unit of measure. Do they mean calories? Pounds? Liters? Let me read the first paragraph to find out OH THERE IT IS. It's calories.
latortuga 18y ago
"...indicating that the increases in energy intake alone over the 30 years studied could explain the weight increase." That seems, to me, to be a far cry from "Increased food intake alone explains" I seem to be smelling a correlation/causation problem.
ensignavenger 18y ago
How did they figure out how much food was thrown away or used for non-human consumption? I think Americans waste a lot of food! If this wasn't accurately accounted for, it could throw the results way off.
yesimahuman 18y ago
Try eating more often but eating less. You aren't so hungry and you get to look forward to a meal every 2 or 3 hours rather than 5. Plus, it's better for your metabolism.
- randallsquared 18y ago
  Yeah, but I find that unless I'm vigilant, my portion sizes creep up just a little every few times I eat the same meal (if I'm fixing it myself). Eating more often while eating less seems likely to eventually end up with me eating normal-sized meals 5-6 times a day. :) One of the major benefits to prepared meals (like frozen dinners) is that you can't add "just a little" more because you feel hungrier today.
  - yesimahuman 18y ago
    I know what you mean, I caught myself doing that at first. What I do now is make sure the meals I have are very high protein and I eat a little more slowly. After a week or so I find myself getting satisfied by the smaller meals.
noss 18y ago
Unrelated, but why is calorie still used for food and not kilojoule? I kind of like the whole SI-unit comparison advantage, for geek values.
jhawk28 18y ago
Just before summer has the highest spike (other than New Years) in weight topics: http://www.google.com/trends?q=weight+loss&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=weight+loss&ctab=0&ge...
nazgulnarsil 18y ago
Something I haven't seen mentioned in this thread yet: I believe that the primary reason that we get on whacked out diets is that we're using huge numbers of substitutes for natural foods which screw up our bodies natural calibration. The craving you have for "sweets"? yeah, there wasn't any readily available source of processed sugar in the ancestral environment. That craving is actually for fruit. This is a low tech version of wireheading. You're short circuiting the built in reward mechanisms of the brain by giving it an overload of the things it considers positive. You crave fat and sugar because these things are rich in nutrients and energy. We're built for scarcity and can't cope when we have unlimited access to these things. Try reducing your intake of junk food and after 2 months you'll find normal cravings start to return and normal foods tasting better.
utsmokingaces 18y ago
Not necessarily true. Asians eat tons more than Americans. their meal portions are at least 40% more and full of carbs (rice). However, Asian meals are have more nutrients, often mixed in with a lot of vegetables. Compare that to slabs of meat and potatoes that Americans like to consume.

26 points by ph0rque 18y ago

binarycheese 18y ago

So HFCS has nothing to do with it? HFSC - High Fructose Corn Syrup

Retric 18y ago
One thery for the issue with HFSC(?HFCS) is they reduce the body's ability to measure how many calories it has consumed which promotes over eating. The other problem is they tend to be in high calory low nutrition food so people need to still need to eat nutrent food and the "empty callories" don't really help. PS: While I have never heard much mention of this, I suspect people crave food that contain nutrents they are missing. So hunger is probably a fiarly complex system that might not be all that robust to "new" food types.
- triplefox 18y ago
  My personal experience with this bears it out; an HFCS soda will be consumed quickly (and I feel unsatisfied) but a sugar one is better to sip through, and I get a better sense of its impact as well.
mdasen 18y ago
HFCS might be a contributor, but would simply show up as an increase in energy intake. If you go from eating X amount of sugars in a day to eating 2X amount of sugars in a day, that just shows up as an increase in caloric intake. This article was trying to contrast energy intake with exercise to see if the obesity seen was being caused by an increase in the amount we ate or a decrease in the amount we exercised (rather than seeing what foods might have been the culprits of the increased energy intake).

kingkongrevenge 18y ago

Taken at face value this only invites the question Why are people eating more? I think a good answer is reduced dietary fat, which sates, and increased starch and sugar intake, which screw up insulin levels leading to regular hunger pangs.

thras 18y ago
Indeed. I take it you've read Gary Taubes' "Good Calories Bad Calories"? Overfeeding studies show that it's very hard to get people to gain weight on protein diets. Carbohydrate overfeeding, on the other hand, can get up to 10,000 calories a day, and people will still complain about feeling hungry. Our ancestors had lots of dietary fat. They didn't have any simple carbohydrates at all.
- sergeo 18y ago
  A recent multi-year study published in The New England Journal of Medicine (abstract: http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/short/360/9/859 http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/short/360/9/859 , full text is also available there) concludes that "Reduced-calorie diets result in clinically meaningful weight loss regardless of which macronutrients they emphasize." 811 overweight adults were randomly assigned to one of four diets: percentages of energy derived from fat, protein, and carbohydrates were 20, 15, and 65%; 20, 25, and 55%; 40, 15, and 45%; and 40, 25, and 35%. By 2 years, weight loss remained similar in all four groups - about 7 lbs. Among the 80% who completed the trial, the average weight loss was 4 kg; 14 to 15% of the participants had a reduction of at least 10% of their initial body weight. Satiety, hunger, satisfaction with the diet, and attendance at group sessions were similar for all diets. Attendance of counseling groups was strongly associated with weight loss (0.2 kg per session attended). Bottom line: 1. It's all about eating less - eat what you like (so you can stick to it for life). As long your calories are reduced (to lose a pound of fat you need to lose 3,500 calories) and you stay within healthy nutrient ranges you will lose weight. 2. Consider participation in some sort of community (or even online groups), for support, motivation and accountability.
  - latortuga 18y ago

Femur 18y ago

Food != Calories The featured article examines calorie intake and not food intake. A pound of apples has a much lower calorie density than a pound of french fries. Changes in the TYPE of food consumed (i.e. increase calorie density) agree with the featured article's conclusions.

chancho 18y ago
I don't see where anyone got this confused.
- Femur 18y ago
  The title of this HN posting is "Increased food intake alone explains the increase in body weight in US" That is not true. It is "Increased CALORIE intake alone explains the increase in body weight in US"
  - chancho 18y ago
    I don't know about you, but I appreciate posters who copy article titles verbatim instead of editorializing. As for the article itself, it very clearly stated that increased energy intake was the culprit. The word "food" by itself does not indicate a unit of measure. Do they mean calories? Pounds? Liters? Let me read the first paragraph to find out OH THERE IT IS. It's calories.

latortuga 18y ago

"...indicating that the increases in energy intake alone over the 30 years studied could explain the weight increase." That seems, to me, to be a far cry from "Increased food intake alone explains" I seem to be smelling a correlation/causation problem.

ensignavenger 18y ago

How did they figure out how much food was thrown away or used for non-human consumption? I think Americans waste a lot of food! If this wasn't accurately accounted for, it could throw the results way off.

yesimahuman 18y ago

Try eating more often but eating less. You aren't so hungry and you get to look forward to a meal every 2 or 3 hours rather than 5. Plus, it's better for your metabolism.

randallsquared 18y ago
Yeah, but I find that unless I'm vigilant, my portion sizes creep up just a little every few times I eat the same meal (if I'm fixing it myself). Eating more often while eating less seems likely to eventually end up with me eating normal-sized meals 5-6 times a day. :) One of the major benefits to prepared meals (like frozen dinners) is that you can't add "just a little" more because you feel hungrier today.
- yesimahuman 18y ago
  I know what you mean, I caught myself doing that at first. What I do now is make sure the meals I have are very high protein and I eat a little more slowly. After a week or so I find myself getting satisfied by the smaller meals.

noss 18y ago

Unrelated, but why is calorie still used for food and not kilojoule? I kind of like the whole SI-unit comparison advantage, for geek values.

jhawk28 18y ago

Just before summer has the highest spike (other than New Years) in weight topics: http://www.google.com/trends?q=weight+loss&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 http://www.google.com/trends?q=weight+loss&ctab=0&ge...

nazgulnarsil 18y ago

Something I haven't seen mentioned in this thread yet: I believe that the primary reason that we get on whacked out diets is that we're using huge numbers of substitutes for natural foods which screw up our bodies natural calibration. The craving you have for "sweets"? yeah, there wasn't any readily available source of processed sugar in the ancestral environment. That craving is actually for fruit. This is a low tech version of wireheading. You're short circuiting the built in reward mechanisms of the brain by giving it an overload of the things it considers positive. You crave fat and sugar because these things are rich in nutrients and energy. We're built for scarcity and can't cope when we have unlimited access to these things. Try reducing your intake of junk food and after 2 months you'll find normal cravings start to return and normal foods tasting better.

utsmokingaces 18y ago

Not necessarily true. Asians eat tons more than Americans. their meal portions are at least 40% more and full of carbs (rice). However, Asian meals are have more nutrients, often mixed in with a lot of vegetables. Compare that to slabs of meat and potatoes that Americans like to consume.