The psychology of food and cravings has been a big topic of research, as hunger and satiety are primal human instincts. However, with the continual growth of diet and workout culture, scientists are striving to understand all aspects of our relationship to food, such as cravings, calorie deficits, and diets. A study done at Johns Hopkins University, published by the Journal of the American Heart Association takes a look at the increasingly popular method of dieting for weight loss called intermittent fasting.
The study aimed to determine which factors with regards to eating and diet can help in losing weight. While sufficient exercise is a crucial and key component to losing weight, the diet an individual follows plays just as important of a role as the nutrients our body receives help it function and grow. This study looked at how effective intermittent fasting was in aiding weight loss. Intermittent fasting is a diet which has been popularized by mass media in which an individual can only eat their meals at specific times in the day. While there are many variations of the intermittent fast, the point is to allow ample time to pass between each meal. The benefit of this would be to reduce the amount of overall calories consumed as the meals are restricted and controlled. However, there is ambiguity around this method of weight loss being psychologically plausible. This specific study gathered approximately 550 adults of various backgrounds. The study asked each participant to log their sleeping, eating, and waking times within each 24 hour window for about 6 months. This allowed the researchers to measure the time intervals between each meal, between waking up to the first meal, and between the last meal to when the participant went to sleep. After analyzing the date, the scientists concluded that they could not find a clear link between the amount of time between meals and weight loss. Instead they observed that the frequency of an individual’s meals and the total amount of calories consumed were more indicative of weight fluctuations.
Dr. Milan Valyear also studies feeding patterns in his paper. This study looks at both restrictive eating in rats. Groups of rats were either given intermittent access to a sucrose solution or they were given a solution with the bitter compound quinine which rats have a strong preference against. Combinations of both meal timings as well as meal components were distributed across each participant group. The study aimed to discover if calorie intake contributed to differences between access induced consumption of a solution that the rats prefer. Results of the experiment revealed that the available solution being distributed and the preference towards which solution is being dispensed combine to determine how much of the solution is ingested.
With regards to diet cultures that arise from mass media rather than accredited scientific research, there is not much not much scientific validity. Feeding is a crucial part of human nature, but has many complex mechanisms contributing to it. Both studies show us that upon close examination, intermittent feeding does not entirely deliver on its promises of weight loss as there are many other factors at play.
Works Cited
American Heart Association. (2023, January 18). Reducing total calories may be more effective for weight loss than intermittent fasting. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 3, 2023 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/01/230118092030.htm
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