Want to lose weight? Your best bet could be to have someone else choose your diet plan, say researchers from the Durham VA Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina.
According to new research, scientists say people who choose their own diet plans end up losing less weight than those who don’t–something researchers believe occurs because people choose diet plans that contain more of their favorite foods. This, in theory, makes it more difficult for them to eat less.
“People might adhere to a diet better if it has foods that they prefer, but they actually might overeat those foods, and that might be to their detriment,” says William Yancy, author of the study and a researcher from the Durham VA Medical Center. “If the diet that they are following eliminates some of the foods that they prefer, then they might actually lose more weight.”
Published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, researchers came to these findings after recruiting 105 adult participants for a randomized diet trial. Assigned to 2 groups, the participants consumed one of the following: A low-carbohydrate or a low-fat diet, two standard diet plans. All participants followed this diet for 48 weeks, but researchers allowed some of them to switch their diet to a more preferable one after 12 weeks on the program.
That’s when things got interesting, say researchers.
Although all of the participants lost weight after the 48 week trial, not all of them lost the same amount of weight, report researchers. In fact, those who chose their own diet lost 1 kilogram less compared to the other participants. That’s around 2.2 pounds–not a huge amount, but still enough to be statistically significant to researchers.
For Yancy, the results show that you shouldn’t always choose the diet you like the best.
“Although the people in the study who chose their diet plan did not lose as much weight as those who had the decision made for them, this does not mean that doctors should not present their patients with different diet options,” says Yancy. “It is just that [patients] might not be the right people to choose among those options. Contrary to expectations, the opportunity to choose a diet did not improve weight loss.”
Bottom line? You’re not probably the best person to choose your own diet; instead, seek advice from a nutritionist.
What You Should Do
If you’re trying to lose weight, choosing the diet you like the most isn’t always the best idea, say researchers. Instead, you should find a diet that both you and your nutritionist agree on; they’re more likely to be objective about what diet will suit you the best.
Readers: What do you think? Should you be able to choose your own diet or not?
Source:
Want to Lose Weight? Let Your Doctor Pick Your Diet – LiveScience.com
Effect of Allowing Choice of Diet on Weight Loss: A Randomized Trial (Study) – Annals.org
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