French Fries = Bad
Yogurt = Good

BY MARY ELLEN

Good vs BadA recent New York Times arti­cle high­lights the find­ings of a study con­ducted by some Nerds (note the cap­i­tal “N”) at Har­vard who ana­lyzed the fac­tors that influ­ence weight gain among well-educated men and women who were healthy and not obese at the start of the study. Here are a few of the highlights:

  • “This study shows that con­ven­tional wis­dom — to eat every­thing in mod­er­a­tion, eat fewer calo­ries and avoid fatty foods — isn’t the best approach … What you eat makes quite a dif­fer­ence. Just count­ing calo­ries won’t mat­ter much unless you look at the kinds of calo­ries you’re eating.”
  • The aver­age par­tic­i­pant gained 3.35 pounds every four years, for a total weight gain of 16.8 pounds in 20 years.
  • The foods that resulted in weight loss or no gain when con­sumed in greater amounts dur­ing the study: fruits, veg­eta­bles and whole grains. Com­pared with those who gained the most weight, par­tic­i­pants in the Nurses’ Health Study who lost weight con­sumed 3.1 more serv­ings of veg­eta­bles each day.
  • The foods that con­tributed to the great­est weight gain were not sur­pris­ing. French fries led the list: Increased con­sump­tion of this food alone was linked to an aver­age weight gain of 3.4 pounds in each four-year period.
  • That yogurt, among all foods, was most strongly linked to weight loss was the study’s most sur­pris­ing dietary finding.
  • Metab­o­lism takes a hit from refined car­bo­hy­drates — sug­ars and starches stripped of their fiber, like white flour.

There’s much more cov­ered in the arti­cle and the full report, includ­ing things like peanut but­ter (good!), sleep (get enough, but not too much), alco­hol (glass of wine is ok), and smok­ing (bad!).

Related Posts with Thumbnails